#second wave ska

[skell10]

HOLY FUCKING SHIT

IF YOU ENJOY SKA AND SEE THIS POST PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE LISTEN TO THIS SONG IT IS SO GOOD I SWEAR

[queerdissidence]

I don't know what it is, but the second Madness comes on every braincell leaves my head and I become overwhelmed by the urge to dance like a fool. I'll be waking down the street fighting to stop myself skanking (incredibly badly)

[randomvarious]

Bad Manners - “Walking in the Sunshine” (live recording) Ska Giants Song recorded in 1988? Compilation released in 1997. Two-Tone / Ska

When the second ska wave hit in the UK between the late 70s and the early 80s, there was a collection of five bands who ended up ruling the scene: The Specials, The Beat, The Selecter, Madness, and, of course, Bad Manners. And do you know which out of all of those bands formed first? Bad Manners did, in 1976. The rest of those top-billed groups merely followed in their footsteps. But Bad Manners also had something that none of those other bands had: an inordinate amount of lovable zaniness, which set them apart from their peers 

It was sort of like cheating in a way. Bad Manners was a band that prioritized spectacle over substance and it worked beautifully. They were to two-tone what KISS is to hard rock and what GWAR is to metal. They’re good at the music, but they’re not exceptional. It’s all the other stuff that puts them over the top and makes them really memorable. People went to Bad Manners shows because they loved two-tone but also because they had no idea what was going to happen. And that played a huge role in earning the band its legendary status.

Front-and-center in Bad Manners is a huge specimen of a bald-headed man who calls himself Buster Bloodvessel. He is both tall and wide and is said to have weighed 30 stone (420 (blaze it!) pounds) at one point in his life. It’s through Buster that the band earns its clown prince reputation. He is their leader and lead singer and is responsible for most of the antics. Bloodvessel is like a rejected pro wrestler persona; a guy who bounds into the ring with a bucket of paint and pours it on himself for no apparent reason other than to drive home the point that he’s certifiably insane as his opponent puts on a face of bemused horror; a guy who escaped the asylum to become the village idiot; an oafish clown without his makeup. While performing live on Italian TV, Bloodvessel once famously pulled down his pants and showed his immense rump to the camera, leaving an indelible memory in countless Italian minds, an image that all who saw will carry to their grave, including Pope John Paul. Needless to say, Bad Manners were swiftly banned from performing on Italian TV after the stunt. Out of sight, yes, but Bloodvessel’s giant ass was certainly never out of mind for so many.

1980-1983 were the peak years for Bad Manners. They charted twelve times, with four of those entries hitting the top ten. They had at least one song on the UK charts for 111 consecutive weeks. One of the band’s biggest hits was “Walking in the Sunshine,” which managed to peak at #10, and came off of their third album, 1981′s Gosh It's... Bad Manners. Look at how, no matter what the setting of the video is, Buster Bloodvessel always manages to be silly in some way, from the absurd ways he walks and dances, to the exaggerated movements of his large mouth.

But by the mid-80s, the popularity of two-tone had waned. Some of the big five had packed it in and Bad Manners landed on an American label, with their new music unavailable to their UK fans. In ‘87, they broke up, and Buster formed a new band called Buster’s Allstars. But all of that was short-lived. Buster’s Allstars dissolved and a new, downsized, reinvigorated iteration of Bad Manners then formed.

That brings us to the year in which I think this live performance of “Walking in the Sunshine” was recorded, 1988. The liner notes on the many Bad Manners compilations, as well as the various artist comps the song also appears on, don’t provide much detail, so I’m left to form my best educated guess as to when it was actually performed. I won’t say the live version’s better, but I won’t say it’s worse, either. The original and this live recording from seven(?) years later both have their merits. But one thing they most definitely have in common is the overall feeling of haziness generated by the instruments. You know when you’re driving on a hot day and you look as far as you can up the road, and it’s all wavy like Dali’s clocks?

Well that’s what the organ on this song feels like, in both versions. And the lingering last of the three-note horn section tags also largely contribute to that haze. But there’s some big differences between the songs, too. While Bloodvessel’s vocals on the original have a considerable amount of reverb, which also add to that hazy feeling, there’s no vocal reverb on the live recording. Instead, the live recording boasts a much thicker and richer set of horns, almost like that of a big band jazz group, and the live version has a much more prominent bassline, too.

Two-tone had long had its moment in the sun by the late 80s, but Bad Manners showed they still had a lot left in the tank at that time. You can’t see this song’s performance, but you can pretty much guarantee that Buster Bloodvessel was still dancing like a self-aware, fun-loving idiot, just like he had been doing since 1976.

A live recording of a classic from these daft legends of the UK’s two-tone era.

[testtubetunes]

The Pogues - Celtic Ska EP

First off, let me tell you how lucky I was and still am to have this amazing piece of vinyl in my collection! As most of you probably know, I love Celtic music, I absolutely adore The Pogues and I also happen to have a very deep love for ska.

Exactly a year ago, one of my best mates Chris tagged me in a post about a record shop in the US selling a bunch of these after they found some in their storage room. They charged me 15 dollars for it, which is an absolute steal, knowing that they are rarely for sale at all. You can’t even get it on Discogs since the release has been blocked from their Marketplace for some reason I sadly do not know. 

It does have some killer tunes on it, such as ‘’A Message To You, Rudi’’ (Live At The Town & Country 1988) featuring Lynval Golding, the guitarist from the legendary second wave ska band, The Specials.

If you can get your hands on this beauty, definitely do so! - Dee

[aurazoo]

The Daily Skank: Second-Wave Ska band The Toasters' "Don't Let The Bastards Grind You Down," off the 1997 album with the same title. This was their first album to drift away from solely staying in the 2-Tone genre!

[acitybythelightdivided2006]

IMPORTANT MESSAGE TO PEOPLE WHO DISLIKE THE SPECIALS

fuck u

[titus-lemonade]

I would like to that jacksophone, I now have begun my obsession a genre. First and second wave Ska. This will be a fun few weeks. Goes great with the weather. Until the bitch Mother Nature makes it snow again.

[t-imebomb]

i just want friends who share my love of rancid and operation ivy or even ska/punk in general hmu

[jaccobanana]

Always nice to listen to some Bad Manners on a Saturday night. What an underrated song.

[randomvarious]

The Volecanoes - “Don’t You Tell Me” Ska Giants Song released in 1989. Compilation released in 1997. Two Tone / Second Wave Ska

The Volecanoes were a very brief offshoot group of a much more well known UK two tone / ska band called Arthur Kay & The Originals. Debuting all the way back in 1980, it would take Arthur Kay & The Originals nine years to release their first LP on Skank Records. And the Volecanoes released their only album, Skatoon Time, not too long after on the same label.

Although the Volecanoes only had one LP, a bunch of their songs can be found littered throughout a bunch of late 80s and early 90s ska and two tone compilations. 1997′s Ska Giants, released by Dressed to Kill, is a two disc collection of songs from that particular era and features the Volecanoes’ fun and happy-go-lucky tune, “Don’t You Tell Me”.

Truth be told, I found a picture of the back cover of Skatoon Time online, but the artist credits are very blurry, so I can’t make out a) who’s in the band, and b) what each of them is responsible for on the album. There’s a sweet coalescence of rhythms on this one though, with a guitar that’s responsible for the skank and an organ synth that offsets it. Nice and taut, subtle bass plucks all throughout, too. “Don’t You Tell Me” has a very catchy chorus with vocal harmony as well and features a nice, little chord change for the final verse.

An enjoyable, under-the-radar late 80s two tone / ska tune from this pretty unknown band.

[anarcho-succulents]

The Specials - You're Wondering Now (by KingLeon1daz)

[starbrand]

 * b writes THIS MACHINE KILLS FASCISTS on a trumpet and runs up to random people and taking a deep breath acting like i'm going to blast a note but i never actually do it

<b> i think i got confused midway through typing that.

<b> but, even if i didn't, english would still be a doggy doo. so i think we can live with it.

<jason> it makes sense, but if you were to take those actions in the real world you might have to watch out for cops tracking you down and putting you behind bars for threatening people with ska

<jason> holding people at horn point

<b> congress hesitant to enact legislation making being really really annoying illegal

<jason> our prisons are over-crowded enough as it is

[stompbox-rnr]

Bad Manners | "I Don't Care If the Sun Don't Shine"

[skatoon-network]

the Specials Pandora station...

All first and second wave goodness. <3 

[themaefive]

I love this song so hard.

[randomvarious]

Big 5 - “Non Shrewd” Ska Giants Song released in 1995. Compilation released in 1997. Two Tone / Second Wave Ska

You won’t find much info about this low-key supergroup comprised of members and ex-members from some of the biggest bands from UK’s 80s and early 90s two tone scene. Nick Welsh and Martin Stewart came from Bad Manners and The Selecter, Jennie Matthias came from The Belle Stars, John Bradbury came from The Selecter and The Specials, and I have no idea who Simon Cookson is.

The Big 5 continued the two tone tradition well into the 90s, nearing a decade after the third wave had materialized in the States. They also had no horn players, which sounds pretty antithetical, doesn’t it? What is a ska band without horns? Is it even ska? It is, if you know how to replicate and replace the horns with other instruments, which is what the Big 5 did really well. They debuted in 1996 with a live album and a studio album. They then released their third and final album in 1997.

I imagine this live recording of “Non Shrewd” took place in the middle of a set (sometime between 1992 and 1995 and presumably in the UK) with the group reviving some hits from each member’s former bands. “Non Shrewd” was actually originally recorded by Bad Manners (Welsh and Stewart’s old band) in 1988. This particular rendition by the Big 5 first made its appearance on a compilation called Tran to Ska Ville, released in 1995. It then appeared on Dressed to Kill’s triple-disc Ska Giants in 1997.

Nick Welsh, who performed vocals on the Bad Manners version, also supplies lead vocals on this one. His voice is just as forcefully booming and bellowing as it was in 1988, but much more gargly and gravelly this time around. Simon Cookson’s guitar reproduces the memorably pleasant horn melody on the intro and bridge.

And this is how you pull off being a horn-less ska band. You need two instruments to play that genre-defining, skanking, offbeat rhythm. Martin Stewart on keyboard and Simon Cookson on guitar play the rhythm mostly in unison, and if you don’t listen that closely, you could mistake their playing for horn stabs. Stewart’s keyboard flourishes during the verses, played along with John Bradbury on drums, are also little pieces that keep the instrumentation fresh. Jennie Matthias joins on the chorus with backing vocals, too.

Fun, little, live cover of a late 80s two tone classic.