3rd Wave Flashback: Never Before Seen Photos of the Skavoovee-era Toasters in Action!

A few weeks ago, photographer Pete Reitzfeld (twin brother of Sid Reitzfeld of the '80s NYC ska bands The A-Kings and Thick As Thieves) handed me ten 11" x 17" prints of black and white photos he had taken of The Toasters back in 1993 or so (note the Skavoovee tour shirt in one shot), but didn't give to the band at the time because he didn't think they were quite good enough. (A few years earlier, Pete had taken the band photo featured on the This Gun for Hire artwork.)

Not that I'm an expert, but I think I have a pretty good eye, and these shots of The Toasters capture that band's live energy really well and are worth sharing (that night, they were most likely performing songs from New York Fever and the then forthcoming Dub 56). My old iPhone camera doesn't quite do Pete's prints justice, but we're going with what we've got.

The Toasters' horn section (l-r): "Rocksteady" Fred Reiter, Brian Sledge, Rick Faulkner.

Rob "Bucket" Hingley

Coolie Ranx

Jonathan McCain

The Toasters' rhythm section (l-r): Matt Malles and Jonathan McCain.

Rocksteady Freddie and fans. 

Rick Faulkner

Sledge

Bucket 

Duff Review: The Selecter at The Gramercy Theatre, NYC (10/6/16)

(By Steve Shafer)

After being blindsided by their surprisingly great show in NYC three years ago, The Selecter featuring Pauline Black and Arthur "Gaps" Hendrickson drew out a wonderfully large contingent of old school stalwarts (Chris Acosta of The New York Citizens/Moon Records, Marc Wasserman of Bigger Thomas, Andre "The Nubian Nightmare" Worrell from Mephiskapheles, Checker Phil) as well as more recent fixtures of the NYC ska scene to Manhattan's Gramercy Theatre, all of whom were eager to hear the tracks from The Selecter's indispensable 2 Tone album Too Much Pressure that have been seared into our minds and held close in our hearts all of these years. I've seen different iterations of The Selecter three times--in September 1992 at Tramps for the Out on the Streets tour with Neol Davies and Pauline, who were backed by Nick Welsh and Martin Stewart from Bad Manners; then back in 2013; and again this week (I don't have a clear memory of catching The Selecter's set with Gaps and Pauline during the 1993 Skavoovee tour they did with the The Skatalites, Special Beat, and Toasters, though I was at the NYC show at the Hammerstein Ballroom and remember the floor actually bouncing while the crowd danced)--and each time The Selecter has put on a fantastic show, though this may have been the best one yet.

Prior to their set, Pauline, Gaps, and band member Neil Pyzer (who plays sax; recorded and produced their last three albums; and is a former member of post-punk band Spear of Destiny) were behind The Selecter merch table and more than happy to chat, sign anything (like the t-shirt I bought--Gaps even sought out Pauline to have her sign it), or pose for pictures (which were promptly posted on social media--see here and here). There is no better way to connect with fans, spread goodwill (we felt the love!), and promote the tour/band/release. Other ska bands take note: Give the people what they want. Fans just want a little bit of your time and attention--and in return they'll buy your stuff and be forever loyal.

Before The Selecter hit the stage, I caught a good portion of dirty Jersey's Hub City Stompers, who performed a great, energetic set of their punky ska and reggae, the highlight of which was their new song with a four-part vocal harmony opening, "Philly WTF"--which posits the question, what's up with their unusual accent? HCS also played a nice tribute--"Distance Water"--to Roy Radics of The Rudie Crew who passed away earlier this year, which had many in the crowd hoisting their tall boys of beer in the air in tribute.

As this was billed as the "Too Much Pressure Tour," The Selecter performed all of the tracks off that album, but not in tracklist order. I thought the renditions of "Out On the Streets," the underrated "Black and Blue," "Missing Words," "Street Feeling," "My Collie (Not a Dog)," and "Danger" were particularly powerful. "Too Much Pressure" segued into Toots and Maytals' "Pressure Drop" and back. One of the few non-Too Much Pressure album songs was "Breakdown" (an excellent "Ghost Town"-like track about societal disintegration that has led to the police killings of unarmed people of color in the US and UK from The Selecter's most recent album Subculture--read The Duff Guide to Ska review of it here), which ended with two snare drum hits that sounded like gun shots, immediately (and brilliantly) followed by the haunting guitar arpeggio that opens the anti-gun "Celebrate the Bullet." Gaps' moment in the spotlight was his song of regret over what might have been in "It Never Worked Out" (also from Subculture). Another high point was an epic version of The Ethiopians' "Train to Skaville" (from The Selecter's 1980 12" of the same name, with "The Whisper" and band's much preferred second studio version of "Street Feeling" on Side B). Pauline introduced "On My Radio" by noting that this hit single wasn't included on Too Much Pressure in the UK, but by the time the record was released in the US, it had been included (along with "They Make Me Mad"). The energy never flagged during The Selecter's hour and a half show and the vast majority of people on the floor danced the entire time (it would have been hard not to). They didn't rely on fan love and nostalgia to carry the night, but performed as if they had everything in the world to prove--and we appreciated The Selecter all the more for it.

At one point early in the Selecter's set, I looked over to my left and was stunned to find that I was dancing right next to music journalist and post-punk musician Vivien Goldman (for a time, she was Bob Marley's PR person at Island Records and was the author of his first biography; she wrote about punk, reggae, and post-punk for NME, Sounds, and Melody Maker; collaborated with a who's who of post-punk musicians on her own recordings and as a member of The Flying Lizards; and is currently an adjunct professor at NYU). I'm such a huge fan of her music and writing that I couldn't resist briefly introducing myself. I told her how much I love the recent compilation of her work and that I wrote a review of it for this blog (read The Duff Guide to Ska review of Vivien Goldman's Revolutionary (Songs 1979-1982) here). She was perfectly lovely and asked me to email her the link to the post (which I did!). Running into Ms. Goldman capped off an already fantastic night.

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Thanks to Bryan Kremkau of SkaPunkPhotos.com and ReadJunk.com for the use of his beautiful pix. On a related note, apparently 2 Tone photographer Chalkie Davies also was at The Selecter show taking shots!

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Jump Up Releases The Toasters' "Dub 56" on Vinyl!

Toasters' fans and ska vinyl freaks should take note that the band's stellar 1994 album Dub 56 has been re-issued on wax for the first time by Jump Up Records. (The demand for vinyl in the US was at its nadir in the early 90s, so it was never released in this format, here or abroad.)

At the time of its release, the US ska scene had really begun to heat up--in no small part due to the 1993 national Skavoovee Tour with The Skatalites, Selecter, Special Beat, and The Toasters that provided a slew of opening slots for local ska bands and really helped galvanize the ska scene--and Dub 56 showcased the band at their best, with now-classic tracks like "Mona," "Legal Shot," "Dub 56," "Direction," "Ain't Nuthin'" and many more. Dub 56 became an instant fan-favorite, received raves from critics (see here, here, and here), and went on to be one of Moon Records' best-selling records ever.

This LP is available from Jump Up Records in clear or white vinyl for $12 and includes a digital download card for the entire album in digital form, plus four bonus tracks not on the LP: "Dub 56 (Chat Mix)," "Legal Shot (Dance Mix)," "Legal Shot (Gangster Mix)" and "Ain’t Nuthin’ (Chorus Mix)."

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Where did the title of the album and song come from? It was the license plate number on Bucket's dad's motorcycle (you can make it out on the original artwork)--and the song is about (momentarily) leaving all of your problems behind by taking a fun spin on the motorbike...

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It should be noted that in 1995, Stubborn Records released a 7" single of "Dub 56" with the album version on one side and "Dub 56 Chat" on the other (the last copy of which is for sale at Stubborn for $100). Also, the CD was licensed to sister labels in the UK (Dojo), Germany (Pork Pie), and Japan (Jimco).

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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...