Duff Review: "Blue Beat Baby: The Untold Story of Brigitte"

(Review by Steve Shafer)

Blue Beat Baby: The Untold Story of Brigitte, a new 30-minute video documentary by Joanna Wallace, does an excellent job of piecing together the largely forgotten story of Brigitte Bond, who inadvertently inspired the design of The Beat girl. While the average ska fan knows 2 Tone's Walt Jabsco was created by Jerry Dammers (and refined with help from Horace Panter and John "Teflon" Sims) and based on a photo of Peter Tosh from his early Wailers' days, far fewer are aware of the origins and background of The Beat girl.

In Blue Beat Baby, Wallace explains that Brigitte Bond was a popular Soho burlesque performer who showed up to welcome Prince Buster at Heathrow Airport in 1964 during his first tour of the UK (to promote I Feel The Spirit). In the process, she was photographed and filmed dancing with Buster in the terminal (most likely a calculated move to help generate press for her then forthcoming single and supporting gigs). A little over a decade later, one of these photos was re-published in Melody Maker in the spring of 1979 (see it above), just as 2 Tone started to rule the airwaves and charts. Cartoonist/graphic artist Hunt Emerson, who was tasked by The Beat to quickly come up with their logo (and later designed the covers of the first two Beat albums), spied the photo of the beautiful and fashionably mod Bond dancing with Prince Buster and modeled his striking--and now iconic--Beat girl illustration on her. Notably, neither Hunt Emerson nor anyone in The Beat was cognizant of Bridget Bond's claim to fame. Emerson was drawn to her elegant sense of style and the wonderful motion of her hips, arms, and legs captured in that phenomenal photo.

Employing archival newspaper clips, strip joint advertisements, and TV news footage, Wallace fills in as many blanks in Bond's story as possible in this compelling documentary. Her professional life on stage, in the press, and on the screen is well-covered here, but little is known of Bond's origins or fate (the trail goes cold in Italy in 1976). However, Wallace highlights several fascinating aspects of Bond's life, such as her (so-so) 1964 ska single on Blue Beat; the episode where she hijacked Billy Graham's attempt to minister/preach to the sinful denizens of Soho, which garnered her worldwide press coverage; and the fact that she is/was a gorgeous, transgender woman (which, refreshingly, didn't seem to be that big of a scandal in the UK at the time--many of her strip club patrons and admirers had no complaints!).

Both The Beat's Dave Wakeling and Emerson observed that after The Beat girl began to be featured on gig posters and Beat merchandise, the band's previously male-dominated audiences were flooded with female Beat fans (and there were far fewer fights at shows). Many girls even began to copy The Beat girl's style of dress. So, a crucial part of Bond's legacy is that her image helped welcome/make space for girls and women in the 2 Tone scene. (Then, as now, representation matters.) Perhaps the most significant unanswered question in all of this is whether Bond is/was aware of her consequential and celebrated place in 2 Tone history.

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On a related note, ska author Heather Augustyn provided research assistance for this documentary and she wrote a chapter on Brigitte Bond in her forthcoming book Rude Girls: Women in 2 Tone and One Step Beyond.

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The Beat's Everett Morton Passes Away at 71

Everett Morton (photo by Adrian Boot)

Terribly sad news comes via Lee Morris of 2 Tone--Before, During & After: The Beat's wonderful drummer Everett Morton died on October 8, 2021 at age 71. His use of complex rhythms and unique style of reggae drumming and percussion lent The Beat an immediately recognizable sound and firmly grounded their music in Jamaican ska, while also allowing the other musicians in the band to take a more unorthodox, punky, and often aggressive approach to the genre--all of which formed the brilliant signature Beat sound.

According to Malu Halasa's essential 1981 biography of the band, The Beat: Twist and Crawl, Morton came to the attention of the fledgling Beat via a friend through David Steele's day job at a Birmingham psychiatric hospital:

"During one afternoon tea break, he [Dave Wakeling] was chatting with his black friend Paulette Sherley, telling her how difficult it was to find a drummer for his band. Band practice was every Saturday--that is when they could get it together. Paulette suggested a drummer she knew in Handsworth. The fellow, free since his last band had broken up, was considered an excellent reggae drummer, and had a van as well, which was what really sealed it. Steele phoned Everett Morton and invited him over to Andy's flat that weekend.

Tall and dark, Everett brought his mate Freddy to check out the mystery band in need of a drummer. While the two Daves and Andy [Cox] rendered "Click Click," "Two Swords" and "Twist and Crawl" on acoustic guitars, Freddy recorded them on his portable sound system. Afterwards, the five sat quietly together drinking tea and listen to the tape, which sounded oddly like The Beach Boys. They were unusually alright, agreed Everett, but it was little early to tell. With electric guitars and a couple of amps they could sound different. The band had arranged to practice properly in the upstairs room of a pub around the corner, The Yorkshire Grey, for a three quid rental fee. Morton promised to join them there on Tuesday night with his drum kit.

Tuesday's practice was a mess. The main problem was that the boys hadn't written any songs with a reggae beat, and Everett had been drumming in reggae and soul bands for some fifteen years. Without the bass and drums fitting together, there was little foundation for the music. Even the guitars seemed out of place. By the end of the evening the four of them, pissed and frustrated, decided to close with an early version of "Noise in This World," an extraordinary punk number. Somehow, it came together. Although vile and very noisy, they played for a long time, which for them determined if a song was any good. They decided to meet again the following week.

Everett had come to England from St. Kitts in the mid-sixties, working in a kettle-spinning factory and playing music in the evenings and weekends. He first learned the drums when his cousin asked him to join his band. After a stint at drum school at Yardley's in Birmingham, and practicing almost constantly on the settee and table in the house, Everett developed his own style and began playing around Handsworth [including Joan Armatrading's band]. He was the most experienced musician in the pack by far, and yet Steele and Wakeling wouldn't hesitate to tell him when songs went wrong.

"You're messing up, Everett. You're messing up." It was hopeless to talk about what the music should sound like. Dave and Everett talking about the same thing would describe it differently, and then end up in a vicious argument. In part it had something to do with Dave's current job at a building site in town. At twenty-three, he was an angry young man. If he offended someone, he expected them to put him right, but Everett didn't think he should have to do that. Strangers ought to have better manners."

When The Beat were preparing to record "Tears of a Clown" for their debut 2 Tone single, it was decided that they needed some saxophone on the track, so Everett introduced them to Saxa, whom he had played with in bands around Handsworth. Of course, Saxa was recruited to join the band almost immediately and his sublime sax playing completed The Beat's classic sound.

One of my favorite Beat tracks is "Psychedelic Rockers" (about dread of nuclear war: "On a night like tonight, when I'm losing my hope/I pray for the best with my heart and soul/It is the hardest...At the edge of your nerves where the lights are pretty/A change in the weather and it smothers the city/Psychedelic, psychedelic, psychedelic war...Well, it's an atmospheric shock...")--which also happens to highlight Morton's fantastic percussion work.

I offer my deepest condolences to Everett Morton's family, friends, and fans. May he Rest In Peace.

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The Duff Guide to Ska Winter/Spring 2020 NYC Ska Calendar #1

Friday, January 31, 2020 @ 11:30 pm

Barbicide (plus DJ Ryan Midnight spinning ska in the front room from 6:00-10:00 pm)

Otto's Shrunken Head
538 East 14th Street (Aves A and B)
New York, NY
No cover, but bring cash for band tip bucket!

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Friday, January 31, 2020 @ 7:00 pm

Top Shotta Band featuring Screechy Dan, Boomshot!, plus Selector Agent Jay

Piano's
158 Ludlow Street
New York, NY
$10/21+

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Friday, February 28, 2020 @ 8:00 pm

Subway to Skaville presents: The Ladrones, Barbicide, Calavera NY Club, J Wahlberg (of The Screw-Ups), plus DJ Ryan Midnight

Otto's Shrunken Head
538 East 14th Street (Aves A and B)
New York, NY
No cover, but bring cash for band tip bucket!

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Friday, March 27, 2020 @ 8:30 pm

The Slackers, Crazy and the Brains, The Scotch Bonnets

White Eagle Hall
337 Newark Avenue
Jersey City, NJ
$20

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Friday, April 24, 2020 @ 8:30 pm

Crazy and the Brains, Catbite, Answering Machine, Love is a Fist

The Gutter
200 North 14th Street
Brooklyn, NY
$8 in advance/$10 day of the show
21+

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Wednesday, May 13, 2020 @ 7:00 pm

The Aggrolites, The Far East

Knitting Factory Brooklyn
361 Metropolitan Avenue
Brooklyn, NY
$20/All ages

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Thursday, May 21, 2020 @ 7:30 pm

NY Ska Jazz Ensemble

The Iridium1650 Broadway
New York
$25/All ages

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Friday, May 22, 2020 @ 8:00 pm

Madness (40th Anniversary Tour), The English Beat (featuring Dave Wakeling)

Manhattan Center
311 West 34th Street
New York, NY
$44.50-$110
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Saturday, June 20, 2020 @ 7:00 pm

Calavera NY Club, Sgt. Scag, Stop the Presses, Disposable

Arlene's Grocery
95 Stanton Street
New York, NY
$10 in advance/$12 day of show
21+

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Saturday, June 27, 2020 @ 7:00 pm

Radicsfest w/The Toasters and more TBA

Gramercy Theatre
127 East 23rd Street
New York, NY
(Tix not on sale yet.)

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Duff Review: Ranking Roger with Daniel Rachel "I Just Can't Stop It: My Life in The Beat"

Paperback
Omnibus Press
2019

(Review by Steve Shafer)

Apart from Malu Halasa's really terrific, if truncated, 1981 biography of the band, "The Beat: Twist and Crawl" (she was Beat guitarist Andy Cox's girlfriend at the time--the two later married--and also ran The Beat Fan Club under the pseudonym Marilyn Hebrides), there's not been nearly enough written about the history of this extraordinary band, so Ranking Roger's autobiography co-written with Daniel Rachel ("Walls Come Tumbling Down: The Music and Politics of Rock Against Racism, 2 Tone and Red Wedge," which includes the best history of 2 Tone that you'll ever read) is a very welcome addition to the growing body of literature focused on the 2 Tone era bands. Roger's "I Just Can't Stop It: My Life in The Beat" is a wonderfully engrossing and satisfying read (it's as if Roger was telling you all this over many cups of tea one afternoon) that provides readers with a very candid look--at times, he's unsparing in his opinions--at The Beat's rise and fall. Of course, it includes Roger's invaluable insights as to how songs came into being; conveys stories related to--and his thoughts on--each album and key singles; and recounts the highlights and lowlights of the band's time on the road. It's everything Ranking Roger and Beat fans could hope for and more.

Clearly, Ranking Roger was the right person (an ideal mix of great talent, charisma, intelligence, and PMA), plugged into the right band, at the right moment in time --all of which was illustrated in this story of his and The Beat's meteoric rise to fame. It was a mere nine months from the time sixteen year-old Roger joined The Beat until they were on Top of the Pops promoting their debut single for 2 Tone, "Tears of a Clown" (which reached #6 on the UK charts). Yet, through all this and his time with The Beat, Roger was remarkably mature and level-headed in learning how to successfully navigate his way to adulthood with humor and grace, despite the pitfalls of instant fame and the intense scrutiny/focus that resulted from being one of the first and few black pop media icons (along with Pauline Black, Neville Staple, Lynval Golding, and Rhoda Dakar) promoting an anti-racist message of "love and unity" in a very racist society.

The following passages are particularly profound and relevant to fans of Roger and the band--and are illustrative of Roger's clear-eyed assessment of his life and experience with The Beat.

When he was nine, Roger Charlery's family moved to Stetchford, which was an area with a heavy National Front presence, so he was forced to create strategies to deal with racists during his formative school years:

"Over time I developed my own ways of dealing with racism. If somebody said, 'You're a wog,' I would say, 'Yes, I am a Western Oriental Gentleman.' If they said, 'You're a nigger,' I'd say, 'That's one of the longest rivers in the world,' with the knowledge that the word derives from the River Niger where slaves were exported from West Africa. I would use my mouth, but non-aggressively. I was trying to each them something. Of course, if all else failed, I punched them." 

Roger added:

"There's been many a time when I've got on with racist people. When I've asked them why they're racist they don't really know. I concluded their bigotry came from their parents. I would say, 'If you like me you can't be racist.' They would say, 'You're all right, Roger. It's the others.' I would say, 'I am the others. I'm a representative of the others.'"

The Beat and other 2 Tone acts--most of which were interracial, played black music, and were actively involved in promoting racial tolerance--often drew large contingents of racist and Nazi skinheads to their shows, some were fans (talk about cognitive dissonance), while others paid the entrance fee to be there to disrupt the goings on or cause violence. Learning how to effectively counter/shut them down was a steep learning curve for the band. During The Beat's first tour supporting The Selecter in the summer of 1979, they encountered a particularly hostile audience in London. Roger recounted:

"It was packed with about five hundred skinheads. From backstage we could see the audience shouting 'Sieg Heil' and doing Nazi salutes. We were all terrified...I was like, 'I've got to go on stage to that? What's going to happen? The first coin that's thrown at me I'm down in the audience. I'll knock them out.' We went on and throughout the gig the chanting continued. I was saying to myself, 'Just keep going. If you jump into the audience someone might have a knife.' Thank God we were good and there wasn't any serious trouble. The flagrant Nazism on show was a shock but we went down really well. The music got through. But as we came off stage, Desmond Brown, The Selecter's organ player, started shouting at Andy [Cox], 'Don't you ever fucking do that again! You're a cunt if you get scared by an audience.' He obviously had taken umbrage at our nonaggression and was laying it on really thick...We were all going, 'London is fucking heavy.' How do you weigh that up? We're educating racists? It gave me reason to want to continue. From that night on I had something to fight for and I came to believe that wherever there is racism, Beat music should be played. In its very essence it is anti-racist music."

But Roger soon figured out the best--and non-violent--response to the racists in the audience at Beat shows:

"The fascists would do it to wind you up. You had to ignore it and show them that you were better than that. From then on I always used the power of the microphone to control a situation. It was a great art to learn. As soon as there was a fight, it was, 'Right, everyone stop. Spotlight on them two now.' Then I'd say, 'What do you think of this lot,' and the rest of the audience would boo. 'Okay, you want them out. Let me hear you say "Out...out...out."' You'd get a big cheer and then go into the next number."

In a similar vein, one of Roger's observations about the racist undercurrent of a certain strain of twisted patriotism in the United States in the early 1980s has particular resonance today with a white supremacist in the White House:

"Dave wrote 'I Am Your Flag' about young working-class men being used to fight in the name of nationalism dying to become man because I am your flag. While we had been on our in America, we were struck by how proud people were of their flag. You would see the Stars and Stripes everywhere. If you saw that many Union Jacks in England, you'd think 'National Front.'"

Roger was referring to The Beat's debut album I Just Can't Stop It in the following passage, but it aptly captures the band's essence and speaks to their great appeal:

"I loved The Beat because it was about two sides of the coin, in every way: in subject; in music. It crossed borders and appealed to a socialist conscience or simply to people in relationships, who could say, 'I've experienced that.' We were talking about real things--whether they be political, social or romantic--and our experiences. Punk and reggae lyrics were about social reality. We just updated it to sing about our lives. Songs like 'Two Swords,' about racism, or 'Big Shot,' which Dave wrote about capitalism after standing in the freezing cold at a bus stop in Five Ways [in Birmingham] trying to get to work. He said he would watch Rolls-Royces and BMWs go past and the drivers would deliberately steer into puddles and splash everyone in the queue."

The band's most overtly political song was, of course, "Stand Down Margaret," which was released as a single (in a dub version) with "Best Friend" on the flip side--and all proceeds going to the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) and Anti-Nuclear Campaign, aimed at shutting down nuclear power plants ("Psychedelic Rockers," the b-side to "Too Nice to Talk To," expressed the very real dread of dying in a nuclear war: "On a night like tonight, when I'm losing my hope/I pray for the best with my heart and soul/It is the hardest...At the edge of your nerves where the lights are pretty/A change in the weather and it smothers the city/Psychedelic, psychedelic, psychedelic war...Well, it's an atmospheric shock..."). But expressing their fiercely anti-Thatcher sentiments (in response to her racism and xenophobia--Thatcher: "People are really rather afraid that this country might be rather swamped by people of a different culture"; slashing of funding for education, housing, and social services; privatization of state-owned industries; wholesale business deregulation; and her belligerent Cold War stance aligned with Ronald Reagan that included allowing the US to base cruise missiles in England--making it all the more likely to be on the USSR's list of first strike targets, should nuclear war ever break out) came at a steep price. "Best Friend" b/w "Stand Down Margaret (Dub)" was the first Beat single (an amazing, double AA sided one at that) not to crack to the Top 20--they later learned that the BBC had secretly banned it--and Roger noted that even though Wha'ppen sold well (and many of its songs, like "Get-A-Job," "All Out to Get You," and "Monkey Murders," were pointed commentary on the state of things under Thatcher's rule; I got a kick out of learning that Wakeling wrote "Drowning" while holed up in the Empire Hotel in Manhattan--later in the 1980s, I lived there while going to college nearby, since the school's campus had no dorms), none of their post-"Margaret" singles did well on the British charts, and the next and last album Special Beat Service was much better received in the US than the UK. Even though Roger opined that it was probably their proudest moment, it marked the turning point that led to the eventual downfall of The Beat.

With an increasingly hostile UK press, suspected surveillance ("We were taking risks and there were times we thought we were being watched by the government. They probably sought we were communists or subversives. We would see suspicious-looking people at our gigs. It was very scary."), and imposed limits on their charting (and financial) success, led the band to shift their lyrics from political to interpersonal conflict (to focus on one side of the coin, so to speak) with Special Beat Service, and concentrate more on the receptive college rock/new wave scene in the US than what was going on in Blighty.

"The disenchantment in the UK surrounding The Beat signposted a new beginning for the band. For us, it was like, 'Well, we've said everything we have to say politically,' so as the band got more popular in the States, we started writing more pop and love songs. The next batch of songs replaced political issues with personal politics: we live with politics and we live with people. There's politics in relationships. It was good to combine the two, and as they used to say in the Seventies, 'the personal is political.' It got us to the next level."

The Beat's break-up came after a Top of the Pops appearance in support of the final Beat single, a remix of "Can't Get Used to Losing You" (from the What is Beat? comp), and three dates opening for David Bowie (and, afterwards, apparently an offer to open for Bowie on a nine-week tour of North America). Instead of continuing work on demoing songs for The Beat's fourth album, Dave Wakeling and Ranking Roger left the band. Wakeling had spoken to Roger privately and repeatedly about it during their 1983 tour of America with REM (in 1982, they had toured the US with The Police and The Clash; they also played both US Festivals), convincing him of their elevated self-worth and how much more they'd earn splitting everything two ways instead of evenly with the rest of the band, as was their practice. In this book, Roger readily admits to succumbing to greed and hubris and, in time, came to massively regret this decision. He surmised that the never realized fourth Beat album--a combination of All the Rage... and Fine Young Cannibals--would have been pretty fantastic.

Loads more of interest is covered here, including tales about General Public and some dish about Madonna, Gwen Stefani, and The Bangles' Susannah Hoff (and there are the cliched rock star exploits about hooking up with countless women on tour in America that don't play well in this #MeToo age, but I suppose go along with the warts and all tenor of the book). And I never knew that "Save It For Later"--their most popular and enduring song in the US--was written during Wakeling's Isle of Wright days, before The Beat formed, when he and Cox were building frames for solar panels. They used to perform it during The Beat's early days in Birmingham, but didn't record it for I Just Can't Stop It, because David Steele thought it was "too rock...too old wave." (It's one of their greatest tracks and it helped buoy my spirits countless times when someone in my life or life itself was disappointing; but I've always found it depressingly juvenile that Wakeling wrote the lyric as a play on "save it, fellator," which gives "just hold my hand while I come...to a decision on it" a different spin, and insisted on printing the "fellator" lyrics on the inner sleeve of the Special Beat Service album that I picked up when it was originally released.)

While "I Just Can't Stop It: My Life in The Beat" was never intended as Roger's final memorial--there was certainly much more music for him to make and performing left to do (he became sick following the completion of this manuscript)--after reading this book (and listening to his excellent, final album Public Confidential, which he felt really captured spirit and sound of original band), one comes away from it with the sense that his life was so well-lived and to the absolute fullest--and that his fans (myself included) were so fortunate to share part of his life and gifts through his and The Beat's incredible recordings and live shows.

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MOJO Remembers Ranking Roger

Beat fans should take note that the June 2019 issue of MOJO contains a wonderful tribute by Lois Wilson to the late and sorely missed Ranking Roger. Click on the image below to read/enlarge the article.

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In case you haven't read it, The Duff Guide to Ska posted a remembrance of Roger back in March.

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In Memory of Ranking Roger of The Beat

Photo: Adrian Boot (from "The Beat: Twist and Crawl" book by Malu Halasa;
note Saxa in the background!)

(By Steve Shafer)

This past January, during an extraordinary videotaped chat titled "Wha'ppen" with music journalist and author Daniel Rachel where Ranking Roger talked so candidly about his strokes, discovery and removal of two brain tumors, immunotherapy treatment for lung cancer, and the prospect of facing his own mortality, one could see in his eyes how understandably shaken he was by the whole experience--but his words, voice, and facial expression conveyed nothing but hope for his recovery, a desire to perform again for the 2 Tone 40th anniversary celebrations even in limited physical health ("I know I can sing!"), and deep gratitude for his many fans' expressions of support. And as clearly dire as his situation was, one absolutely believed that if anyone could beat cancer, it would be Ranking Roger.

So, the news that Roger passed away on March 26 at the painfully young age of 56 was profoundly unfathomable. How could someone bursting with so much love, joy, and life NOT be alive anymore?

The (English) Beat, along with Echo and the Bunnymen, were the soundtrack to my high school years--always on heavy rotation in my Walkman, on my stereo (WLIR loved its Special Beat Service--though my friends and I had many debates over which of The Beat's three albums was the best), and when I could commandeer it, the family car. As they were for many people, those particular years were tough ones. I didn't fit in at all at my school (I was a middle class suburban kid lost in a sea of incredibly wealthy kids from Park and Fifth Avenues) and absolutely dreaded practically every minute spent there. I also was probably dealing with some depression, too. But the music I so zealously loved validated (important for the teenage psyche!) and expressed whatever I was feeling--whether up ("Best Friend") or down ("Save It For Later"), pining away ("Hands Off, She's Mine"), or political ("Stand Down Margaret")--and lent me the strength to keep getting out of bed everyday just to take it on the chin.

It's always a shock to the system when someone so closely associated with your youth dies. Even though we know better, they're frozen in time in our minds; we've aged, part of them hasn't (so it breaks our hearts when reality intrudes). Back in the day, probably a lot of Gen X Beat fans like me felt what may have been an unconsciously close connection to Ranking Roger. After all, he was still a teenager (16 years old!) when he joined The Beat in 1978 and was only a few years older than me and many of my peers by the time we came to know him (whereas the rest of the band seemed like they were solidly adult men, even if they were only in their early 20s--with the exception of middle-aged Saxa!).

I only had the pleasure of catching Ranking Roger live in performance a few times. The first was when General Public played The Ritz in NYC in December 1984. Roger's hair was dyed in alternating blond and brown stripes (like it was on the cover of ...All the Rage) and he was amazing to watch--he was in constant motion on stage, covered in sweat, and clearly enjoying every second he sang for and interacted with the audience. (I missed seeing him with The Beat--I found out about their Special Beat Service related show at Roseland in Manhattan the day after it happened and felt like an idiot for weeks afterwards.) And I caught him a few times with the wonderful Special Beat in the early 1990s, too.

My well-worn Beat cassettes from the early 1980s.

Last fall, Ranking Roger's version of The Beat was scheduled to co-headline a tour of the West Coast with Pauline Black and Gaps Hendrickson's Selecter and I had big hopes that a few East Coast dates might be added, as The Selecter has done extremely well the last few times they've been in NYC, and it had been ages since Roger last played here. Sadly, it was cancelled when Rogers' health issues began to manifest themselves. But I never imagined that he wouldn't recover and eventually find his way over here again.

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In Malu Halasa's 1981 band bio "The Beat: Twist and Crawl," the reader is introduced to Ranking Roger as someone, "who talked like a Rasta but had anarchy symbols all over his leather trousers and jacket. His hair, short braids on top, was dyed bright red and ginger. Aside from being one of Birmingham's few black punks, Ranking had charisma. During a Damned show at Barbarella's (Brum's only punk hangout), the audience, a rough mix of punks and skinheads, started chanting NF slogans. Roger, who had been toasting in various pubs around town, highjacked the DJ mike and began singing in rhythmic Jamaican style "Fuck-off, Fuck-off De Na-tion-al Front! "Fuck-off, Fuck-off De Na-tion-al Front!" Soon the entire audience was chanting along with him. He had earned his nickname from some sweet, white girl at school whom he loved dearly, but who had refused his advances, calling him "Ranking" instead. Ranking Roger was too crazy to be anybody's boyfriend."

According to Halasa, 16 year-old drummer Roger Charlery--a first generation black Briton whose parents had immigrated to the UK from the Caribbean island of St. Lucia--first encountered the fledgling Beat (Dave Wakeling on rhythm guitar and vocals, Andy Cox on lead guitar, David Steele on bass, and Everett Morton on drums) in 1978 when they were slated to open for Roger's punk band The Dum Dum Boys at a Birmingham pub called The Matador. It was The Beat's debut live performance. This connection led Dave Wakeling to invite Roger to see The Beat during their Tuesday nights residency at another pub, the Mercat. Roger (who had toasted with UB40, the reggae band Eclipse, and a reggae punk band called the Visitors) was soon on stage toasting during The Beat's reggae tracks and the band soon invited him to stay with them for their entire sets. By the end of the residency, he was a full-time member of the band and could crash at Dave Wakeling's flat whenever he needed to.

Over the summer of 1979, which began with The Specials releasing their self-produced debut single "Gangsters" with The Selecter's "The Selecter" on the flip side, The Beat got their first of several lucky breaks, a gig at Ashton University with Radio One's John Peel as DJ. Halsa recounts that Peel was so blown away by the band that he ended up swapping his payment of £360 for their £80 (he felt they worked harder than he did for it) and talked up the The Beat on his next radio show. Then, an opening slot for The Selecter led to a supporting space on the bill for their short UK tour. And this led them into The Specials' orbit; Jerry Dammers approached The Beat after their London show to offer them a deal to do a single on 2 Tone. As they prepared to record their debut single "Tears of a Clown" (backed with "Ranking Full Stop"), The Beat decided the song needed a sax to complete its sound; Everett Morton knew of an old Jamaican musician who had played with Prince Buster, Laurel Aitken, Desmond Dekker, and supposedly The Beatles, and Saxa (born Lionel Augustus Martin) soon completed the The Beat's line-up. That fall 2 Tone exploded (The Specials, Madness, Selecter, and Beat singles topped the charts and all appeared on Top of the Pops)--and the rest is well-trod history.

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In his brilliant and essential oral history "Walls Come Tumbling Down: The Music and Politics of Rock Against Racism, 2 Tone, and Red Wedge," Daniel Rachel, who had completed working with Ranking Roger on his forthcoming autobiography "I Just Can't Stop It: My Life in The Beat" prior to his death, documented The Selecter's manager Juliet De Valero Wills recalling that "The Beat was more of a natural fit to 2 Tone [than fellow Brummies UB40]...They had that black-white thing and the look--it was a no-brainer--and Roger jumping around all over the place. He looked amazing and absolutely summed up the youthful energy of 2 Tone. He always had a smile on his face."

Roger also is quoted by Rachel summing up The Beat's driving mission: "The Beat was definitely a political band but we have long songs and a commercial side too. It was a balance. It was politics at home: meaning politics with your woman, or whoever is governing your country, and world politics. And it was our experiences. We saw racism; we wrote about it. We saw unemployment; we wrote about it. We saw war; we wrote about it. We were singing about realities, like punk and the reggae acts from the past. We just updated it to what was happening to us. Like 'Doors of Your Heart,' Stick him a room and turn off the light/Bet you couldn't tell if he was black or white? The philosophy behind Beat lyrics was throwing questions. Give them a story and let them decide for themselves. The spirit was promoting peace, love, and unity."

And that was Roger's guiding principle throughout his whole life: "I said a love and unity/The only way!" (from "Whine and Grine/Stand Down Margaret").

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When Ranking Roger sang together with Dave Wakeling, it was as if they were twin baritones--two halves of the same fantastic, resonant voice. During some songs, you couldn't tell where Dave ended and Roger began. But only Roger could toast (so incredibly well and effortlessly) and it gave The Beat an edge and appeal that the other 2 Tone era acts couldn't really touch. Go back, pull out all your old Beat albums and singles, and marvel at him on "Psychedelic Rockers," "Pato and Roger A Go Talk," "Doors of Your Heart," "French Toast (Soleil Trop Chaud)," or whatever your favorite tracks are.

Roger's most recent album with his version of The Beat, Public Confidential (read our review of it through the link below), was finished prior to his illness and it serves as an extraordinary parting gift to his fans. If you haven't heard it, get it.

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Towards the end of the "Whap'pen" video with Daniel Rachel, Roger talked about his life's work: "Every time the gig is finished or nearly finished, I just see pure smiling faces. So, I know I'm doing the right thing, the righteous thing...It's the most brilliant job anyone could have had is being an entertainer. You can be in front of all of those people and you can move them and make them all happy. That's the most joyous thing that I could have done."

Roger's life was so well lived. May we all be so lucky. Long may his spirit and music live in our hearts and minds.

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Below, please find Ranking Roger-related Duff Guide to Ska reviews and write-ups:

Duff Review: The Beat Featuring Ranking Roger Public Confidential

Duff Review: The Selecter/The Beat Split Single "Breakdown" b/w "Side to Side"

Duff Review: The Beat Featuring Ranking Roger Bounce

Duff Review: The English Beat Live at the US Festival '82 and '83

Duff Review: The Clash featuring Ranking Roger "Red Angel Dragnet" b/w "Rock the Casbah"

Duff Review: The Spritely Allstars featuring Ranking Roger "Two Swords (Majestic Mix)" b/w The Stiff Joints "Ackee 123"

Adventures in Record Collecting: The Beat's "Psychedelic Rockers"

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Duff Review: The Beat Featuring Ranking Roger "Public Confidential"

DMF Records
CD/LP
2019

(Review by Steve Shafer)

It's a bit of bad luck/timing that The Beat Featuring Ranking Roger's pretty sensational Public Confidential was released around the same time as The Specials' Encore, as all of the hype, press, and "controversy" (not all original band members involved; many new tunes don't attempt to recreate Specials' trademarked 1979-1981 2 Tone sound, etc.) over that terrific record will surely overshadow The Beat's. One can only hope that the great success of The Specials' album (#1 in terms of album sales on the Official UK Charts as I write this) will whet both active and dormant ska fans' appetite for even more new music from 2 Tone era-bands--and they'll seek out this incredibly good record.

As with The Specials, who musically quoted "Ghost Town" for new tracks "Vote for Me" and "B.L.M.," there's a bit of DNA from earlier Beat hits in Public Confidential ("Maniac" and "Who's Dat Looking" nick some "Mirror in the Bathroom" and "A Good Day for Sunshine" essentially versions one of the Beat's top songs, "Best Friend") to demonstrate to the fans that they're keeping faith with the band's classic I Just Can't Stop It sound (particularly the great and late Saxa's ethereal horn lines and the manic rhythm section with its roller coaster bass riffs) and to ease their entry into the new material constructed on the old. In one or two brief instances, it seems a bit blatant and contrived, but overall doesn't detract/distract, as the cuts themselves move into compelling new directions quickly. What's even better are several of the new songs here that don't rely on old musical reference points, but are completely brilliant and Beat-like on their own (see "Public Confidential," "On the Road," and "Dangerous," amongst others).

Roger's version of The Beat continues to be engaged and concerned with the world around it. The driving and effective "Maniac" is about being pushed closer to the brink by right-wing/authoritarian-minded leaders like Trump and May (who are the unhinged ones referenced in the title, not the singer): "Don't dictate what I can or can't say/Clean your streets of me, you discriminate/Take away every right to fulfill our roles...Create fear, create the enemy/Don't you tell me how it's meant to be/You need to calm me or I detonate/You've got me ticking..." In the same vein, "Who's Dat Looking" is outraged with the total-information-awareness surveillance state--with how everything we do in both the real world and online is tracked, then monetized or weaponized, leaving citizens without any privacy or control: "Watching me like I've committed a crime/You're thinking of ya bugging me/You say it's for my safety/But nothing's gonna make me buy into your society/Say, who's dat looking?/Look into the sky like a million eyes/Got a remote control key in my back/With no invitation you're checking my location/The privacy you track, you attack/Say, who's dat looking into my eyes?"

But there's hope and power in the people (as there always is in the ballot). The amazing "Public Confidential" is about imagined crusaders at a muck-raking tabloid, advocating for the people and holding the powerful accountable: "We take responsibility because we care/We find a helping hand, that's when it goes missing/They can try stopping us if they dare/Remember, ain't gonna let ya, we're gonna get ya/Eye on critical, the street don't lie/Nobody gonna close our eyes/We're public confidential, we're public potential/'Cause we should know what's going down!"

The pros and cons of touring are recounted in "On the Road" (co-written and with shared toasting by Roger and his son Ranking Junior): "Say every weekend got a show/That's why I'm always on the go-go-go...Every single weekend me pile inna van/Traveling across the United Kingdom/Me a share a can with plenty fan/They a say me give dem a inspiration." It's a bit of a thrill when Roger works in "I just can't stop it" into his lyric as he describes the charge he gets out of performing forty years after The Beat's debut. In "Dangerous," Roger essentially reclaims the 2 Tone meaning of rude boy--it's about making music not crimes ("A who dat man?/A who dat a come?/'Cause any time he come I say him well troublesome/A who dat man?/A who dat a come?/'Cause I'm a Ranking Roger with the sound that go down...You think you is a bad man when you flash me your knife/Next thing me hear you take another man's life/Well dem boy say is dangerous/Artificial and dangerous...").

One song that is guaranteed to buoy one's spirits when they're down is "A Good Day for Sunshine"--a minor miracle of a cut in that it captures and conveys the feeling of being in love and completely happy/contented and wanting to share that with everyone you meet ("Feels good/because you're mine...I want to catch the sun/Put in my pocket for someone/And make everything alright/'Cause it's a brand new day/And we know it's not about the weather/'Bout a feeling that's coming my way/I'm getting ready for the sunshine of mine"). This cut and either "Maniac" or "Who's Dat Looking" would make a dynamite double A-sided single.

All in all, long-time Beat fans will find Public Confidential to be a completely satisfying and enjoyable record. It builds on the many strengths of Bounce and sounds more like a Beat record than Dave Wakeling's recent and superb Here We Go Love (which had a strong General Public vibe running through it). Public Confidential was recorded before Roger's dire health issues were diagnosed and being treated (two brain tumors, both of which have been removed, and lung cancer, for which he is undergoing two years of immunotherapy)--his singing and toasting are spot-on throughout (he's in really terrific form) and his Beat band is first-rate.

We fervently hope that Roger will be in good health soon, as well as be able to perform some of the wonderful songs on this record at any 2 Tone 40th anniversary events held during this milestone year.

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Duff Review: The Specials "Encore"

Island Records/UMG
CD/2xCD/LP
2019

(Review by Steve Shafer)

Barely a day after fans had a chance to unwrap the cellophane from their CDs or LPs and social media was already afire, grinding out both brutal condemnations of and impassioned praise for the new Specials album Encore. (In contrast, in the music press, the album has generated mostly positive, if not glowing, reviews.)

What seems to be lost in the instantaneous rush to judgment is that after years of touring since their reunion in 2009, we finally have an album of new music from the current, if pared-down, version of The Specials (Terry Hall, Lynval Golding, and Horace Panter--joined by top collaborators Nikolaj Torp Larsen on keys, Kenrick Rowe on drums, and Steve Craddock on guitar) and they deserve fans' respect and support for doing so, full stop. This in itself it is momentous.

As for why The Specials have released this album now, one suspects that they didn't want to show up for the 40th anniversary of 2 Tone with nothing in hand. Their peers have been pretty busy moving forward of late (see Madness' Can't Touch Us Now, The Selecter's Daylight, Dave Wakeling's Here We Go Love, Ranking Roger's Public Confidential, and Rhoda Dakar's The Lotek Four, Volume II--all of which are great!), while The Specials have been mining their catalogue for their admittedly phenomenal live shows for years now (I just re-watched the video I shot of them playing "Nite Klub" on Pier 26 in NYC in 2013 and they're so good that the hair on the back of my neck was on end). So, fan expectations are high, probably impossibly so.

Perhaps the best way to approach The Specials' Encore is to attempt to put The Specials' late '70s/early '80s releases temporarily out of mind (these classics do loom large) and take a break from basking in the comforting and familiar nostalgia for all things 2 Tone (if you want The Specials of '79, break out their debut). All of the brilliant, youthful, creative tension generated by the original band members' various personalities, talents, egos, opinions, class, educational backgrounds, and drug choices (sped up or slowed down) was never going to be resurrected on this record. This is the middle-aged core of the band that's still standing and able to stand each other. You pined for new music from this decades-on version of The Specials and here it is. So, have at it. (Give it some spins on the turntable or CD player, and live with it for awhile before coming to conclusions.)

With expectations re-calibrated, you'll find that Encore is a thoughtful, well-crafted album with ace performances that picks up where the two camps of the band were heading during and after More Specials (less ska/reggae and a bit more of everything else) and is legitimately great, at times outright stellar, in its own right. The brilliance of the original Specials output (and of 2 Tone in general) was that the music and lyrics moved both your body and mind, and Encore is highly relevant--if generally downbeat--music for our dark and dystopian-seeming times. However, one senses that the music occasionally takes back seat to the very worthy messages contained within (there are three spoken word tracks on the album). Like The Special AKA's In the Studio (which I previously wrote was "a record that often found the world to be a terribly and disappointingly ugly, petty, predatory, and unjust place"), Encore needs its one moment of pure joy, its own "Nelson Mandela" (an impassioned anti-apartheid song about an unjustly jailed political prisoner/freedom fighter that also managed the trick of compelling you to sing along and dance) to counterbalance some of the gloom in the songs and the world around us.

The Specials' deep commitment to the anti-racist ethos of 2 Tone is emphatically and explicitly reaffirmed by Encore's first two tracks--an unexpected but right on cover of the interracial Equals' fantastic hard funk, anti-white supremacist 1971 UK top ten hit "Black Skin Blue Eyed Boys" written by Eddy "Electric Avenue" Grant (which imagines a world of human beings free from socially constructed divisions: "They ain't got no country/They ain't got no creed/People won't be black or white/This world will be half-breed") and "B.L.M.," a spoken word piece by Lynval Golding (which musically quotes both "Black Skin Blue Eyed Boys" and "Ghost Town") that recounts his father's experiences of racism as part of the Windrush generation, as well his own as an immigrant to both England and America ("In England they call me a black bastard/In America they call me a goddam n*gger/Boy, welcome to my world/But I'm not here to teach you.../Black lives matter"). Like his song "Why" (which recounted the horrific, racially-motivated knife attack he endured in 1980 outside the Moonlight Club for walking and talking with two white women), Golding's personal stories of encountering ubiquitous, everyday racism--whether, verbal, physical, or institutional--resonate powerfully.

Upon first listen, it's sort of a shock to hear the opening bars of "Vote For Me" musically quote a bit of "Ghost Town" and then settle into the moody, minor-key territory staked out by The Special AKA's In the Studio (think the reggae and jazz of "Racist Friend," "Alcohol," and "What I Like Most About You Is Your Girlfriend," plus a bit of Rico's Jama; there's also a wonderful, Madness-like bridge with strings in there, too!). On one hand, it makes sense for the remaining Specials to go this route--they're essentially time traveling to pick up where The Specials left off at their demise (and Hall, Golding, and Staple went on to form the Fun Boy Three). So, in one sense, "Vote For Me" is a safe move, reminding the listener of Specials' sounds and songs of old that are ingrained on fans' hearts and minds. Yet, it's also sort of audacious, given how The Specials' dissolution was driven in part by dissatisfaction with the musical direction Dammers had taken with More Specials (he was the band's primary--though by no means sole--songwriter and arranger), as well as his leadership style (his given nickname "The General" was not meant to be endearing). Whether intentional or not, with "Vote For Me" they've validated Dammers' vision for the evolution of The Specials' post-"Ghost Town" music that was realized through In the Studio. It's just a shame that Dammers, Staples, Radiation, and Bradbury and Rico (RIP) couldn't be back for the ride, as "Vote For Me" successfully keeps faith with The Specials' collective sound and mission.

Lyrically, "Vote For Me" is pointed commentary on the corruption, lies, self-dealing, and moral bankruptcy of political leaders in England and America during this dreadfully bleak age of Brexit and Trumpism ("You tore our families apart" has to refer to the absolutely horrific, repugnant, racist, and inhumane Trump policy of sometimes permanently separating migrant/asylum-seeking kids from their parents at the US-Mexico border)--it continues the kind of "government leaving the youth on the shelf"/should be serving the greater good and needs of the people criticism expressed back in '81. And it's fantastic how the chorus ("There are no rocks at Rockaway Beach/And all that glitters isn't gold") references Queens, NY's bruddah's The Ramones, William Shakespeare (and Bob Marley's nod to the bard in "Get Up, Stand Up"), and dings Trump's penchant for gaudiness to hammer home its point about political deception.

Their cover of their own/Fun Boy Three's "The Lunatics Have Taken Over the Asylum" (1981) and the new "Breaking Point" are cut from the same cloth. The former was about Reagan's itchy nuclear trigger and Thatcher's indifference to the poor and destitute and has now been revived for the utter madness of Trump and May. "Breaking Point"--a terrific Madness-y ska track!--is about trying to live in a seemingly out of control world ("Progress would be wonderful/If only it would stop") run by self-dealing and morally bankrupt leaders ("The sales pitch from door to door/Says feed the rich and hang the poor/Twinkle, twinkle little star/Point me to the nearest bar/I'll drown my sorrows with the rest") that is seemingly on the path to oblivion ("With the help of God and a few marines/We'll blow this place to smithereens/Here we are at the breaking point').

The Specials' wonderful version of The Valentines' "Blam Blam Fever" comes closest to being that moment of musical bliss on the album while decrying gun violence--and the band adds some lyrics to address America's insane love affair with guns, its outrageous tolerance of mass shootings of kids, concertgoers, you name it, and the very fact that weapons of war are readily available for commercial sale: "What we gonna do/About amendment number two/Gun fever is back/And we think it is obscene/You can buy AR-15/The gun fever is back/Every time you read the New York Times/Seventeen dead in a school crime...The simplest thing is rat, tat tat, tat tat/NRA how you deal with that?"

While "Ten Commandments" shares the same title as Prince Buster's song, it's not a cover with new lyrics. The Specials' version is a spoken-word answer record to Buster's original with a new instrumental track beneath it (that opens with a similar drum roll) and features Saffiyah Khan listing her version of the commandments from a feminist perspective. Khan, of course, became a potent symbol of progressive resistance when she was participating in a counter-demonstration against the racist, right-wing, and Islamophobic English Defence League in Birmingham on April 10, 2017 and was photographed smiling and relaxed as EDL leader Ian Crossland was angrily in her face after she intervened to stop a number of EDL goons from harassing a fellow counterprotester who was wearing a hijab. Khan's popularity rose even further in certain circles when photographs of her from different angles revealed she was wearing a Specials t-shirt to the counter-demonstration--which led to her being invited by the band to pen the lyrics for and perform on this recording.

This is not the first answer record to Buster's "Ten Commandments." Buster himself released “Ten Commandments (From Woman to Man)” featuring Princess Buster in 1967, which pushed back hard--for the 1960s and within the confines of marriage--against Buster's sexism ("Commandment One: Thou shall have no other woman but me. Two: Thou shall not provoke me to anger or thou will have no peace at night..."). Khan's commandments powerfully and unequivocally refute all of the limitations and expectations that our patriarchal and chauvinist society would impose on her body and volition, solely on the basis of her gender. Her assured declarations of independence and take no prisoners support for women's rights are thrilling to behold. Yet, it's incredibly depressing to realize how little has changed at a societal level--these same ugly and pernicious attitudes towards women were prevalent when The Specials debuted four decades ago (and they were not completely immune to them either; see "Little Bitch"). In fact, apart from the references to femi-nazis, femoids, the internet, and YouTube, these spoken word lyrics could have been written back in 1979.

The Specials back Khan with an orderly, brisk reggae skank that emphasizes the rock solid bass line (Khan says it's from Dawn Penn's "No No No"), but never distracts the listener's focus from her spoken word lyrics. But on the periphery of the entire song there are swirling, dubby synth effects and during interludes between the verses, there are descending, minor-key violin lines--all suggesting a lurking danger and barely contained chaos, like the bottom could fall out at any moment. It's as if Khan's thoughts, will, and voice keep the demons at bay; but in their absence, a terrible darkness seeks to fill the void.

After years of decrying the (eventually repealed) racist Sus laws (where the police could stop anyone merely on the suspicion that they might commit a crime and was used as an excuse to harass/abuse black youth in general) and playing Rock Against Racism gigs back in the day, The Specials' "Embarrassed By You" is a catchy, straight up ska track that calls out the perpetrators of knife violence and muggings by moped gangs for feeding into the pernicious stereotype of black Britons as nothing but low-life criminals preying on whites ("We never fought for freedom for nasty little brutes like you/To come undo the work we do...Shame on the footprints you're leaving behind").

"The Life and Times (of a Man Called Depression)" gives the listener heartbreaking insight as to what Terry Hall has endured for years while dealing with manic depression and schizophrenia (at first self-medicating and finally being treated with psychotropics): "The voices inside his head are playing/Chinese whispers/As all around him play hide and seek; But don't ask him to put a smile on his face or to cheer up." The really lovely jazzy, oddly metered backing instrumental track under Hall's words has horn and flute lines that wouldn't be out of place on In the Studio (or what Dammers has done recently with his Spatial AKA Orchestra). The album ends with the subdued orchestral pop gem "We Sell Hope," which is a plea for love and tolerance and a much needed reminder of what could be if we had a bit more empathy and compassion for each other: "Looked all around the world/Could be a beautiful place to live in...We've got to take care of each other/Do what you need to do/Without making others suffer." The 2 Tone message, version 2.0.

That Hall, Golding, Panter and company have delivered a great Specials album at this point in time is a true gift to the fans. (Take the time to fully appreciate it.)

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Sir Horace Panter Reveals New Specials Album in the Works

Details are few and far between, but yesterday Specials' bass player Horace Panter revealed on his Facebook feed that he had spent his birthday recording tracks for a new Specials album (with original members Terry Hall and Lynval Golding), which is slated for a February 2019 release (he also posted this news on Twitter today). Specials biographer Paul Willo has apparently heard some of the tracks and commented online that they're "brilliant."

Since other 2 Tone-era acts--Madness, Dave Wakeling's Beat, Ranking Roger's Beat, Pauline Black and Gaps Hendrickson's Selecter, and The Bodysnatchers/Special AKA's Rhoda Dakar--have been releasing new music of late, it's good to see the remaining members of The Specials finally making a go of it.

Much more will be revealed in the coming months, no doubt (The Specials' official website hasn't been updated in eons). But stay tuned.

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Duff Review: The English Beat "Here We Go Love!"

Here We Go/Megaforce Records
CD/LP/Digital
2018

(Review by Steve Shafer)

First off--to address the question foremost in fans' minds--Here We Go Love! is a terrific record, full of good-to-stellar original songs and strong performances throughout. Musically, the album picks up where Special Beat Service left off, at a point when the band already had moved far afield from the taut 2 Tone ska of their debut. There is, of course, a good amount of ska and reggae here to please the ska faithful, along with even more New Wave-y pop, rhythm and blues, and soul for the fans who came later. But it's not the styles, it's the songs the carry the day.

The passage of time and accumulated miles on the road haven't diminished Wakeling's considerable songwriting skills--several tracks were embedded in my head from the first listen and many of the songs on Here We Go Love! are worthy additions to his musical canon. The phenomenal Motown-ish "You Really Oughtta Know By Now" ("...but, oh no, you just don't do you") is probably the top cut on the album (and manages to sneak in a nice nod to "Tears of A Clown" while at it), while the sizzling, Stax-infused "Every Time You Told Me" (about knowing you're being played) is a close second. But it doesn't end there. The could be a pop/film soundtrack hit "The One and the Only" might be about Trump or any other supremely narcissistic and cruel person in your life ("Funny how hate can be/He won't hear your crying/Won't have the time of day/He just walks on by/And it's like he doesn't notice/Yeah right..."). Like the great single off this album "How Can You Stand There?," the ska track "Redemption Time" is about failing to stand up to fight injustice--in this case, opposing the status quo and actually doing something to slow down/halt climate change (and its title reminds one of Max Romeo's "Revelation Time" or Willie William's/The Clash's "Armagideon Time" in that all of us and our planet may be in the end times if we don't start changing our ways drastically and immediately...). The "I-can't-believe-how-stupid-it-is-that-we-have-to-still-protest-this-shit" anti-war song "If Killing Worked It Would Have Worked By Now" ("We're all grunts in the human army/Four million at war and one billion starving/Sick to death of those old boys' rules/We'll make our future or we'll die like fools") is brilliant for both its catchiness and humane logic.

It might have been preferable to bill this venture as "Dave Wakeling of The English Beat," as it's clearly his show (no other performers are listed in the CD credits, though they are on The English Beat website) and without the full participation of other members of The Beat in the band, it's not quite in the same vein as The Beat of old. Having said that, several Beat members and associates did have a part in this album (though you're mostly left wondering as to exactly where): Everett Morton is listed as playing congas; the dear, departed Saxa clearly helped with the sax lines for "If Killing Worked It Would Have Worked By Now"--unfortunately, an injury prevented him from actually playing on the album before his passing; and Andy Cox (!) made snipping sounds with garden shears on "You're Stuck" (also, The Specials' Roddy Radiation guested on guitar and The Aggrolites' Roger Rivas played some organ). Liner-notes obsessives will be interested to know that Bob Sargeant (who, of course, beautifully produced the first three Beat albums, as well as records for The Ruts, XTC, The Damned, Fine Young Cannibals, and many of John Peel's BBC sessions with post-punk bands like The Fall, Buzzcocks, Gary Numan, Gang of Four, as well as Madness and The Specials) was one of the executive producers of this album; and Hunt Emerson, who designed the iconic Beat Girl logo and striking cover artwork for I Just Can't Stop It and Wha'ppen?, has created fantastic artwork for this release!

Despite its prolonged gestation, Dave Wakeling deserves full credit for (finally!) moving ahead with excellent new material (like his peers in Madness, The Selecter, and Bodysnatchers who have released amazing records over the past few years) and not relying solely on nostalgia and former glories (and the first three Beat albums were glorious!) to keep on filling the venues while touring non-stop. Here's to hoping that Here We Go Love! marks the beginning of a new and prolific creative phase for Wakeling. He's still got the goods and then some...

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RIP, Saxa of The Beat

The Beat were (left to right) Ranking Roger, David Steele, Saxa,
Andy Cox (behind Saxa), Dave Wakeling, and Everett Morton.

From the opening notes of The Beat's 1979 debut single for 2 Tone (their incredible cover of Smokey Robinson and the Miracles' "Tears of a Clown") through to the closing, lingering sounds of "Ackee 1-2-3" (from the last track on their third and final studio album, Special Beat Service, released in 1982), Saxa's exuberant, lush, and free-flowing tenor saxophone horn lines were integral to the band's music (providing a relaxed, improvisational contrast to the tightly wound, bullet train of a rhythm section)--giving The Beat a distinct and instantly recognizable trademark sound that managed to bridge the opposing energies of dubby reggae and punk-fired late '70s British ska.

Born Lionel Augustus Martin in Jamaica on January 5, 1930, Saxa performed with fellow JA ska superstars like Prince Buster, Desmond Dekker, and Laurel Aitken (and later backed Elvis and The Beatles). Already 50 by the time he was recruited to join The Beat (having emigrated to England 25 years earlier), Saxa not only contributed his prodigious musical talents to the band, but lent the upstart ska revivalists immediate legitimacy through his participation in the first wave of ska with the aforementioned '60s ska originators.

In Daniel Rachel's brilliant "Walls Come Tumbling Down: The Music and Politics of Rock Against Racism, 2 Tone and Red Wedge" (the best history of 2 Tone that you'll ever read), Ranking Roger recalled: "Days before we went into the studio [to record "Tears of a Clown"] we found Saxa. He was this old, loud Jamaican man that just got drunk all the time and was always aggressive and cussing and swearing. There must have been a good thirty-five years' difference between us but as soon as he blew that saxophone, baby, you'd shut up."

Dave Wakeling added: "Everett [Morton] used to take us to the Crompton in Handsworth where Saxa played. He was the most mesmerizing saxophone player we'd ever heard. He played a couple of gigs with us and then said, 'I've been waiting all my life for you boys.'"

After three phenomenal albums, The Beat split into General Public and Fine Young Cannibals, but Saxa continued working with both factions, appearing on studio recordings for both acts (and later recording and touring with the The International Beat and Special Beat).

Saxa passed away on May 3, 2017 at age 87.

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The Beat's Special Beat Service was released in 1982 when I was 16 and was on heavy rotation throughout my high school and college years (it still remains an all-time favorite, along with all of the other original Beat albums). Saxa's riffs on all of these tunes are permanently engrained in my mind and I'm forever grateful for his extraordinary music and life.

I offer my deepest condolences to his family, friends, colleagues, and fans.

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Duff Review: Specialized II "Beat Teenage Cancer" 7" Vinyl Singles

Jump Up Records/Specialized
2013
Three red vinyl 7" singles

(Review by Steve Shafer)

This series of terrific singles have been spun off from the Specialized II Beat Teenage Cancer CD, which is both a tribute to the The (English) Beat and a fundraising vehicle to benefit the very worthy Teenage Cancer Trust in the UK (listen here to a BBC World interview with Dave Wakeling about the project). The Specialized benefit CDs--the first celebrated The Specials--are put together by The Specials' biographer Paul "Willo" Williams and typically feature UK and US ska bands.

Shockingly, Beat Teenage Cancer is the first Beat tribute album in existence (!). How can it be that a band as brilliant and beloved on both sides of the Atlantic as The Beat hasn't been honored like this before now? Fortunately, especially in light of how tribute albums can go south quite easily (see The Clash tribute album, Burning London), the covers on these three singles more than honor the originals, while refashioning them in fantastic new ways.

Nick Welsh "Save it for Later" and Rhoda Dakar "Too Nice To Talk To" b/w The Values featuring Neol Davies "All Out to Get You" and Lee Thompson "Madness (Acoustically Speaking)"

The great and prolific Nick Welsh (AKA King Hammond, also ex-Skaville UK, The Selecter, Bad Manners) strips down and downshifts the tempo of "Save It for Later," which must surely be The Beat's most famous song in the USA (ever since high school, I've tried to figure out what this song is really about--apart from the jokes about fellatio spelled out in the album lyric sheet--I've heard it suggested that it concerns holding off on sex in a relationship, but I've always thought it's more of a plea to consider keeping a messy, almost completely broken relationship going instead of ending it). Nick's incredible semi-acoustic version (with slide guitar by B.J. Cole) lives somewhere between African highlife, American country, and Hawaiian steel guitar music--and transforms the song into something stunningly beautiful and unique (Dave Wakeling even mentions how much he likes it in the linked BBC World interview linked above). Nick's good friend (and sometime collaborator) Rhoda Dakar (ex-Bodysnatchers, The Special AKA) turns in a fantastically haunting version of "Too Nice To Talk To" that's a cross between something you'd hear off the trippy/dubby Massive Attack vs. Mad Professor's No Protection and the discordant no wave jazz/pop/reggae of The Special AKA's In the Studio. 

The Values with Neol Davies (of The Selecter, of course) put a sweet jazzy/pop spin on one of my favorite tracks from Wha'ppen, "All Out to Get You" (though, sadly, they don't include these key lyrics that offer an escape from the paranoia and self-loathing: "Until you accept/that you’re just like the others/You’re a boy or a girl/Then a man or a woman/and your clothes never fit/and your skin’s the wrong colour/So, you make do with fear/you get more than you need/Yes, they’re all out to get you/All over nothing/They’re painting your life/in a permanent grey..."). While Lee Thompson (Madness' saxophonist, of course) doesn't contribute a Beat song--he does a weirdly wonderful spoken word (with jazz accompaniment) rendition of the Prince Buster's classic song (and his band's namesake) "Madness"--I guess the connection could be The Beat's love of Buster and their covers of his hits "Rough Rider" (actually written by Eddy Grant and his fellow members of The Four Gees!) and "Whine and Grine" on I Just Can't Stop It.

The Spritely Allstars featuring Ranking Roger "Two Swords (Majestic Mix)" b/w The Stiff Joints "Ackee 123"

While I miss the breakneck tempo of the original, I've really come to like The Spritely Allstars' (with toasting by Ranking Roger during the dub break!) mellow, reggay-ish cover of the anti-violence track "Two Swords" ("I’ve never been one for the punch-ups/But, look, I really hate them nazis/A certain something starts to wind me up/How could I hate them oh so violently/When two swords slashing at each other/Only sharpen one another/And, in the long run, even he’s your brother/Said even though that kid’s a nazi...Are you fighting the Front, or just fronting a fight?/Sometimes it’s hard to see/the left from the right/Are we angry, are we looking for peace?/Or just tryin’ to win the war/by killing all the enemy off?/Just to kill all the enemy off?"). We should note that The Spritely Allstars includes Hunt Emerson on guitar and melodica; he, of course, designed The Beat's dancing girl logo, as well as the iconic covers for I Just Can't Stop It and Wha'ppen.

The Stiff Joints nicely convert "Ackee 1-2-3" (a children's game that is like a combination of Hide and Seek and It) from its original calypso arrangement to ska and in the course of doing so retain the unrestrained joy, optimism, and exuberance of The Beat's version from Special Beat Service (my favorite lyrics here: "Forward where the knocks are hardest/Some to failure some to fame/Never mind the cheers or hooting/Keep your head and play the game/Try to keep your feet on the ground/Without getting them stuck in the mud/You will soon be over the moon/or twice as hot as the sun!").

Dave Wakeling "Mirror in the Bathroom" b/w Bigger Thomas "Sole Salvation" 

Dave Wakeling's new version of "Mirror in the Bathroom"--a club/jungle remix, really--has elements of it (namely, the vocals and sax) that sound so close to the original cut from I Just Can't Stop It, that I had to double-check the Specialized website to confirm that it is indeed a new recording of the song. There already are two remixes of this track in existence, found on the excellent B.P.M. ...Beats.Per.Minute compilation. So, while this isn't essential, it's another excellent versioning of this early Beat hit that's definitely worth owning (and so nice to have on vinyl!). This song is about narcissism that verges on mental illness, though the voice toasting on this remix celebrates the joys of smoking sinsemilla--which, interestingly enough, some people with mental illness use to self-medicate, in an attempt to alleviate their symptoms.

I have to disclose that I'm friends with members of Bigger Thomas--and I'm also in a group with few of them (Rude Boy George)--but that doesn't prevent me from digging (and praising!) their awesome version of The Beat's Jam-like "Sole Salvation" (key lyrics: "Make a cross/Make amends/Set the record straight/We’ve never said/the only things we should have ever/Bothered saying/Let's write out a list of things we need/Let's strike a brand new deal/That’s strong for any man/But has a woman's understanding in it/and then finish!/Just stop, when you feel like saying/“Have a heart, but don’t take mine”/Try a new dance “The Tolerance”/It just might be our sole salvation"). With guest vocalist Jenny Whiskey of the Hub City Stompers nicely augmenting their sound (appropriately so, since the song is about a man and a woman figuring out how to make their relationship work/last), Bigger Thomas brings this track fully into the ska fold, from The Beat album with the least amount of ska on it, and adds a spectacular New Wave-like outro.

+++++

The latest word from Paul Willo and the Specialized camp is that Madness will be the focus of the next benefit CD...

Boss Dave Wakeling Interview!

Here's a sweet interview with Dave Wakeling that came our way via Beacon Audio where he talks about why he tours in the US as The English Beat; learning the guitar completely wrong (but having Pete Townsend call him up years later in order to learn the chords for "Save it for Later"); what it's like having his guitar in the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame; and the best part of performing live.

+ + + +

The English Beat are performing in the New York City area on July 12th at The Bell House in Brooklyn, July 13 at The Stone Pony in Asbury Park, NJ, and on July 18 with my buds Bigger Thomas at The Sellersville Theater in Sellersville, PA.

Also of interest are the deluxe reissues of The Beat's catalogue in the UK, plus the release of The Beat box set (The Complete Beat) in the US.

2011 London International Ska Festival: A Yank's Perspective

While I was bummed that I wasn't able to attend the 2011 London International Ska Festival (for a whole host of reasons), I am really happy to be able to include this review from an American ska fan who made the journey. NYC ska fan Andrew Rundle, a regular Duff Guide to Ska reader, was kind enough to write up his impressions of the festival and share them via this blog.

All in all, the London International Ska Festival was a huge success--hats off to the organizers. For me the high point was The Trojans’ performance during which they brought out Rico to lead the band for about two-thirds of their set (see them all in action above), and had Lynval [Golding of The Specials] out singing and dancing for part of the set. Another personal high point was seeing Bim Skala Bim performing again; the last time was as one of the opening acts for The Bosstones’ Hometown Throwdown. The announcement that Bim was going to be on the bill basically sealed the deal that I was going to fly to London for the festival. For the audience in general, I think Dave Wakeling’s version of The English Beat was the most eagerly anticipated act--in the pubs around the venue the buzz was all about Dave. He performed a killer set, much better than recent outings in New York City, and stuck to The English Beat material rather than doing The English Beat/General Public mash-up I have seen several times in the US. He also had Rhoda Dakar and Jennie Bellestar as backup singers and my only critique of the set would be that they were under-utilized. It was also a thrill to see Ken Boothe, whom--up until the Festival was announced--I had given up hopes on seeing; great voice, great performance.

Probably the weakest act at the festival was Dave and Ansel Collins backed by The Caroloregians. It took them several songs to get in sync, with all Caroloregian eyes focused on Ansel, who sort of conducted the band. There also seemed to be some tension as to when Dave was actually going to take the stage--"Monkey Man" came and went before the vocalist actually appeared. It didn’t help that they were preceded by The Hotknives and The Loafers, who had both reformed for the show and turned in excellent sets to large fan bases. In many ways Friday night peaked with The Loafers. James Hunter on Thursday gave a strong performance, but his soul sound seemed like an odd choice for the festival. One hiccup was a misprint in the show schedule, which, combined with my decision to see the Chelsea game, caused me to miss The Amphetameanies.

The Clapham Grand is an old theater/dance hall with great sound and sight lines--and handy proximity to several pubs, a Cornish pastie store, and a kebab shop claiming to have “probably the best kebabs in London.” The crowd was there to dance and enjoy the music; there was one minor scuffle on the dance floor that was quickly shut down by the staff. A large portion of the audience had clearly been fans of skinhead reggae and 2 Tone back in the day when they were teens. Usually in NYC, I am one of the older people in the crowd, but at the Clapham Grand I was on the younger side of the age spectrum. It was cool to meet fans from across the world and hear about various ska scenes--people were there from Japan, the US, Australia, and South America. Also on Thursday night, Buster Bloodvessel was in the audience enjoying the music and dispensing hugs to fans.

I hope the festival proved to be as big a success for the organizers as it was for the audience. I would love to see this become a continuing festival.

Thanks, again, to Andrew for the LISF report!