Time to Check Hoi Polloi's Ska Almanac!

Don't forget to check Hoi Polloi Skazine's ska almanac at least once a month to keep on what went down each day in the history of ska...March is almost done!

Reissue of Expanded "Dance Craze" Magazine/Book

Thanks to Johnny Reggae at Hoi Polloi Skazine for the tip that Garry Bushell's Dance Craze-related magazine (originally published by Sounds) has been re-issued with expanded content (see a PDF of the original magazine here--and Marco on the Bass has some additional interesting background info about it).

The extras this time out include never before published photos of Madness, The Beat, The Selecter, Bodysnatchers, and The Specials by photographer David Arnoff and a postscript by the author.

The book is available to order through Acid Jazz in the UK--and would probably make a nice present for the rude boy or girl on your Xmas or Hanukah list!

Toasters June Mini Tour of Northeast US

The Toasters will be doing a mini-tour of the Northeast US this June (including a booze cruise in NYC on the East and Hudson Rivers on the 12th...glad I have good sea legs!). Dates are as follows:

June 2011 Toasters US Dates

Thurs 9th Allentown, PA @ Crocodile Rock Cafe

Fri 10th Rochester, NY @ Dub Land Underground

Sat 11th Erie, PA @ The Crooked I

Sun 12th New York City, NY @ Rocks Off Concert Cruise Aboard The Jewel

Mon 13th Hamden, CT @ The Space

Tue 14th Worcester, MA @ Ralph's Diner

Wed 15th Dover, NH @ Dover Brickhouse

Thurs 16th Syracuse, NY @ The Westcott Theater

Fri 17th Poughkeepsie, NY @ The Chance

Sat 18th Wilmington, DE @ Mojo 13

Sun 19th Asbury, NJ @ Asbury Lanes w/Bigger Thomas

Thanks to John at Hoi Polloi Skazine for sending the dancing thermometer artwork (adapted from the Pork Pie version of New York Fever)!

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Also, Megalith recently announced that they now have the expanded CD re-issue of 2Tone Army (AKA Hard Band for Dead) in stock to go along with the LP version that Jump Up Records just issued.

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Lastly, there is a Facebook "discussion" about which classic Toasters song the band should cover on their next album. Let your wish be known here. My votes are for "New York Fever," "Ploughshares into Guns," "One Track Mind," or "Ska Killers."

Preview of King Hammond's New "Showbiz" Album!

Here's the preview video for the tracks on King Hammond's new album Showbiz, which will come out in mid-June (and features a cover illustration by Steve Friel, who is probably best known to ska fans for his work for Unicorn Records and George Marshall's "Zoot").

Pre-order it now directly from the King!

Rocking Steady Skazine

As with many printed publications, the skazines that connected and informed the fans during much of the late 80s and throughout the 90s were decimated by the rise of the internet [insert ominous sounding music here]. And, really, why should the skazine editors go to the trouble and expense of laying out, printing / copying, and distributing a tangible publication (and no doubt lose money doing so), when it suddenly became way easier and cheaper to set up a website or a blog to serve the same function and potentially reach ska fans around the globe? (Having said that, I miss them--will there ever be a new edition of Hoi Polloi again?!--and I greedily treasure the ones that I have in my possession, particularly my old copies of "Zoot!")

Unfortunately, there is the downside to every technological development, and for our little discussion today, that is music file sharing (read my general thoughts on why music file sharing is flat-out wrong and killing the music we love here and here). In regards to the subject of skazines, it seems like far too many ska blogs lazily exist simply to post links to file sharing sites where people can illegally download ska and reggae albums for free. They don't bother to actually review the music, interview the bands, or promote their gigs (and if you want to make it so people can hear a band's music, why not use a free application like Div Share, so fans can stream a song, but not download it?).

Apart from Kevin Flowerdew's awesome "Do the Dog Skazine," few current skazines come to mind. But now we have the ambitious Rocking Steady Skazine out of Germany, which is both a website and e-zine. The Rocking Steady e-zine is already up to issue #2 (find the PDF here)--featuring nice interviews with Vin Gordon, Rico Rodriguez, and Mr. T-bone (do you sense a theme here?); a focus on still active 80s/90s-era bands like Mr. Review, The Busters, and Bluekilla; an article on ska graphic designer Jada Leblanc--and a slew of record reviews (Roy Ellis, Hotknives, Resignators, Mr. T-Bone, and many more). While, at times, it seems like some things are lost in translation (the results of Google Translate often make for rough reading), there are many great things going on here. Do yourself a favor--bookmark Rocking Steady and visit it frequently!

Laurel Aitken Inside Out

Here's a fantastic piece on Laurel "the Godfather of Ska" Aitken from the BBC's "Inside Out" TV program (which must have aired in fall 2010) that provides a good overview of his career--and features interviews with Buster Bloodvessel (Bad Manners), Charley Anderson (The Selecter), Roy Ellis (Symarip), Neville Staple and Lynval Golding (The Specials), Mark Wyeth (Club Ska), and Sandra Aitken (his wife) all commenting on Laurel's life, his extraordinary impact on ska music, and his many musical achievements.



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Hat tip to John of Hoi Polloi Skazine for pointing out this nugget.

A Decade Without Moon

Thanks to John at Hoi Polloi Skazine for pointing out today's significance in the ska world. It's been 10 long years since Bucket sent out this terrible news.

The US ska scene still hasn't yet recovered from this body blow. (Will it ever?)

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On a related, and decidedly happier note, check out Kames Jelly's New Jersey Noise blog for a look back at some of Moon Records' early singles...

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And to cheer you up, check out the HP Ska "Rudy Christmas" holiday playlist!

The Mythology of King Hammond

Much thanks and respect to John at Hoi Polloi Skazine (AKA "the printed word ska archivist") for sharing this fall 1989 article from Scooter Scene (click on the image and zoom in to read it) regarding the supposed identity of the great King Hammond. I had heard anecdotes of Nick Welsh going around to record shops to tell the owners how they should carry this LP--Revolution 70--from this great "lost" artist of the skinhead reggae era (and supposedly some were taken in by his tale), but this is entirely something else. The extraordinarily detailed, hugely entertaining, and wildly improbable back story of this persona and the gleefully brazen showmanship displayed in peddling it are rarely seen these days...(I love how Girlie was supposedly King Hammond's girlfriend and that Laurel Aitken had somehow stolen her away from him!)

The One and Only Hoi Polloi Ska Almanac

Hoi Polloi's always essential ska almanac--updated monthly (which has be a fair amount of work to do, since John isn't simply regurgitating the same old ska factoids from year to year; he's combing through his extensive archive, which has a focus on printed ska-related materials, to keep the public informed)--is worth a regular visit (go there now). For instance, I always forget that Laurel "The Godfather of Ska" Aitken, one of my all time favorite ska performers, passed away on July 17 in 2005. Plus, it was a blast to see one of the old Moon Skazettes that I used to put together displayed with the June entries...

This is an amazing resource for anyone who's into ska.

Ska in 365 Degrees

Sorry that we missed the February ska almanac (a particularly significant month--more on that later), but March is new and good, too--so make sure to check out the next 20 or so odd days in ska history at the always compelling and interesting Hoi Polloi Skazine.

If any date marks Day One of the 90s ska boom, it was February 23, 1993: the night of the sold-out Skalapalooza show at The (new) Ritz (aka the old Studio 54; the old Ritz is what is currently known as Webster Hall) with Bad Manners, The Skatalites, The Toasters, The Scofflaws, Ruder Than You, and The Skunks on the bill! When Bucket and the promoters involved in mounting this concert were putting it all together (I was along for the ride to talk about what Moon would be doing to help get the word out about the show), they had no real idea how it would go over--the odds were probably in favor of it being a complete bust. Sure, there had been minor victories here and there--yet nothing that clearly indicated that ska might break out of its deep underground scene. But it turned out the timing was right (that the promoters were willing to pony up the cash for a radio ad on WLIR advertising the show in the pre-internet era throughout the metro area was nothing short of a minor miracle--and I'm sure it played a large part in the success of that night) and we gave the kids--loads of 'em--exactly what they wanted.

I was stunned as I watched the show from the side of the stage and looked out at more ska fans (2,500) than I'd ever seen in one place in my life. It was obvious that it was a watershed moment in the NYC--if not American--ska scene. Everything had changed: the years of The Scofflaws playing TGIF on Fifth Avenue and 12th Street, and The Toasters dodging batteries thrown at them on stage, and Moon struggling to stay one step ahead of failing distributors were going to begin to pay off. More importantly, it revealed the potential of ska music to be a money-maker for promoters and booking agents (if you wanna see your favorite bands play live, these people need to make some real cash in the process).

One portent for the success of Skalapalooza took place during last few hours of 1992, with the broadcast of the "New Year's Eve Ska Party" on the "USA Up All Night" cable show. It featured The Toasters and The Scofflaws (taped at The Palladium that November) performing minute-long versions of their tunes with various NYC scenesters in their ska finery dancing on stage in front of the bands. (These segments served as the bumpers that aired before and after the ads during all three glorious "Porky's" movies.) It was a bizarro-world "American Bandstand," with ska blaring out of the amps; rudies, skinheads, and mods replacing the generic, whitebread teens--and Gilbert Gottfried and Rhonda Scheer hosting the mayhem instead of Dick Clark (not sure if that is actually an improvement). And that year would culminate with the first and wildly popular national ska package tour known as Skavoovee--which was a direct result of the success of the Skalapalooza show, since the same promoter was involved--with The Skatalites, Selecter, Special Beat, and The Toasters, plus a slew of local ska talent that opened the show at each stop along the way.

I managed to shoot some black and white Super-8 footage at Skalapalooza (film, but with no sound; sue me, I did some arty filmmaking in college) before my camera was confiscated by some Ritz security goons. Didn't matter that I was from the label that helped organize the night, it was their house and I had to play by their rules (no unauthorized filming, no exceptions). At the end of the night, I had to go with one of the promoters to beg the club's manager for the return of my gear. After much groveling on my part, I got it back--with the film cartridge still in it! (Suckers!) These reels of film are waiting for me to dig them out of one of the boxes of ska memorabilia in my apartment. At some point, I'll have them digitized and put them up on the net for y'all to see...

Stranger Things Have Happened

Just before the Thanksgiving break (and here I offer my apologies for not posting much last week--between getting together with extended family and painting our kitchen, I just didn't have the time or energy left over to write anything coherent or relevant), I went to a "publishing party" at my daughter's second grade classroom (where all the parents come to read their child's big writing project) wearing a Toasters "Night Train to Moscow" t-shirt. The assistant teacher, whom I really like and respect, comes up to me and says, "The Toasters--I used to see them all the time back when I as 13 and hanging out at The Wetlands every weekend." Despite feeling kind of old and awkward at this, I tell him that I used to work with the band at their label, etc. and had just seen Bucket a few weeks earlier, etc. at a gig in Brooklyn. Not sure if he was surprised or impressed by this (neither was intended), but what a weird connection--my ska past haunts me wherever I go!

Thanks to John at HP Skazine for the holiday illustration! The choice of food here might not really be Thanksgiving-y, but the sentiment sure is right. And continued respect to Mr. Doug Trendle for having the longest tongue in ska.

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Several Duff Guide readers have been kind enough to alert me that I'm on somebody's naughty list...(and here we are just a few weeks away from Xmas!):



The irony is that as I am a Verizon Wireless customer...have been for years.

New 33 1/3: One Step Beyond

My friend John at HP Skazine tipped me off that the 33 1/3 book series (published by Continuum Books), which features authors writing about specific rock and alternative albums, has recently released a volume on the recording of Madness' One Step Beyond by Terry Edwards, a musician and frequent Madness collaborator who was there 30 years ago...

While I'm waiting for my copy to arrive via Amazon, here's a review of the book that can be found at Popmatters.

I'll also be posting a short review of the expanded re-issue of One Step Beyond in the near future.

Devil's Night Out

Hoi Polloi Skazine has just posted the ultimate Halloween ska playlist (200+ tracks!). If I ran a radio station, this is what I would use for programming on All Hallow's Eve. Go eyeball it and see if John missed anything (and let him know)!

Also, don't forget to check out HP Skazine's October Ska Almanac.

John, are you predicting a lot of snow this winter? (Oops, wrong kind of almanac...)

Oh, by the way, the illustration to the right shows the disembodied head that comes to haunt you if you don't mend your illegal music file sharing ways, kids... Sweet dreams.

An Oral History of 2 Tone Featured in Spin Magazine (Who Knew!?!?)

Thanks to John at Hoi Polloi Skazine for alerting me to the fact that Spin Magazine (which I literally haven't read since about 1987) contains an extensive article on the history of 2 Tone in its October 2009 issue (with sludge rockers Pearl Jam on the cover). A generous sampling of the article, unimaginably titled "Checkered Past: The Oral History of 2 Tone" (but done in a similar format as Legs McNeil's and Gillian McCain's great oral history of punk, Please Kill Me) is up on the Spin website now.

Earlier today, I looked for a copy of this issue at a few magazine shops in my neighborhood, which admittedly is neither hip nor fashionable, but none of them had any copies yet (they're always a little slow on the uptake around here).

Does a major article on 2 Tone in a fairly mainstream US music magazine portend a visit from Coventry's finest at some point in the future? I wanna know!

More Madness Madness

Jeez, look how incredibly young those Nutty Boys were just before they hit it big back in 1979!?!? Click on the article to enlarge it for reading/gawking. (Thanks to John at Hoi Polloi Skazine for the NME clipping--he hopes the band keeps going for another 30 years, as do I!) JP from Skanews/French MIS is sending over a review copy of the Madness tribute album he's helped to produce, 30 Years of Madness, so I'll get a review of that up soon. YepRoc is releasing The Liberty of Norton Folgate CD on September 29th in the US (if you pre-order it, you receive two digital bonus cuts, plus a digital copy of the album now). In addition, for the ska collectors out there, YepRoc is carrying the UK 12-track vinyl release of The Liberty of Norton Folgate on the band's Lucky Seven Records, that features a different track order from the CD, which has 15 cuts. (I picked up the LP through YepRoc for $17.99, which is a lot cheaper than mail-ordering it from the UK.) Maybe I'll finally get my freakin' act together and write up my review of TLNF! Lastly, here is the UK Monty Python-esque telly advert for the latest in a long line of Madness greatest hits comps out there...(actually, it might be worth picking up for bonus DVD of all their videos).




TV Advert for the CD/DVD album 'Total Madness'
Set for release on 21st September through www.madness.co.uk.

CD: The Hits
01. One Step Beyond
02. Baggy Trousers
03. House Of Fun
04. Embarrassment
05. My Girl
06. Our House
07. It Must Be Love
08. Wings Of A Dove
09. The Sun and The rain
10. Tomorrows Just Another Day
11. Cardiac Arrest
12. Driving In My Car
13. Bed and Breakfast Man
14. Grey Day
15. NW5
16. Lovestruck
17. One Better Day
18. Michael Caine
19. The Return Of The Los Palmas 7
20. The Prince
21. Shut Up
22. Madness
23. Night Boat To Cairo

DVD The Vidz:
01. One Step Beyond
02. Baggy Trousers
03. House Of Fun
04. Embarrassment
05. My Girl
06. Our House
07. It Must Be Love
08. Wings Of A Dove
09. Sun and The rain
10. Tomorrows Just Another Day
11. Cardiac Arrest
12. Driving In My Car
13. Bed and Breakfast Man
14. Grey Day
15. NW5
16. Lovestruck
17. One Better Day
18. Michel Caine
19. Los Palmas 7
20. The Prince
21. Shut Up
22. Night Boat To Cairo

I Heart Unicorn (Records)

My friend John at Hoi Polloi Skazine, who has a terrific Unicorn Records discography page up on his site, has kindly posted this article I wrote back in 1998 about the UK-based label and several its many incredible releases (from such stellar acts as Laurel Aitken, Derrick Morgan, The Toasters, The Busters, The Deltones, The Potato 5, No Sports, and more). The history of this label is particularly significant as it provided an international home and focal point for ska after 2 Tone gave up the ghost and while the third wave ska scene found its collective sea legs (yes, there were other good ska labels at the time, particularly in the US, UK, and Germany, but none of them had such a world-wide reach and A-list roster).

The article was originally printed in The People's Ska Annual (on newsprint!) and I believe this is the first time it has been available on-line.

Hoi Polloi's Ska Almanac

I've been meaning to write this up for some time--if you don't already do so, you must regularly check Hoi Polloi Skazine's news section, which is really a fascinating ska almanac that contains all sorts of unexpected factoids that are certain to enhance your life (well, at least they will expand your knowledge of ska).

According to Hoi Polloi, significant ska happenings in the month of July included the passing of the wonderful Laurel Aitken (7/17/06); a celebration of the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission to the moon (7/20/69) with HP's top 40 lunar-related ska and skinhead reggae songs (plus a few relevant punk and new wave cuts thrown in the mix); Ranking Roger's appearance on the cover of Melody Maker to promote the release of Special Beat Service (7/25/82); the Monday Night Ska Extravaganza at Gaz's Rockin' Blues at the Astoria in London with a mind-blowing bill that featured Desmond Dekker, Laurel Aitken, The Trojans, and Maroon Town (7/27/87); and the release of The Specials' debut single "Gangsters," which was at #7 on the UK charts 30 years ago (7/28/79). This is essential reading!

HP editor John Vaccaro has an extraordinary archive of ska-related press clippings and ephemera from the 70s onward (I have a huge backlog of articles and photos he has been kind enough to scan and send me, which I'm going to use for future Duff Guide to Ska articles). Plus, he shares my obesssion with Unicorn Records, the UK-based label that issued an inordinate amount of quality ska in the late 80s and early 90s (Laurel Aitken, Derrick Morgan, The Toasters, Potato 5, The Deltones, Busters, Mr. Review, No Sports, Skaos, Napoleon Solo, Casino Royale, Spy Eye, The Braces, The Donkey Show, the Skankin' 'Round the World comps, etc.) and helped bridge the gap between the 2 Tone and 3rd Wave eras--a weird (pre-internet!) period when the US scene was just starting to coalesce, but the Euro ska scene was red hot. (Unicorn's glow is diminished a bit by accusations that label head Mark Johnson had the bad habit of not paying bands the royalties due them).