The beat that got a generation dancing and brought ska back into the public eye. Produced by Elvis Costello, then still a boy wonder himself, the album built on the sound of the Specials' first two singles, and gave the world its first extended look at Two Tone. Inspired writing and arranging (much of it down to founder Jerry Dammers) with Terry Hall as the laconic front man made for a perfect ...
It’s a sleepy, laid-back kind of vibe that runs through Man Like I, the debut album from North London’s Natty, but don’t mistake it for laziness. The tales we find within mark our narrator out as neither saint nor sinner, bouncing round London’s streets with a badman swagger and an eye for the ladies, but with a skill for a deft, lyrical narrative and a social ...
The young Frederick "Toots" Hibberts honed his vocal skills in the church. No surprise then that the music he recorded with The Maytals is largely gospel-tinged and very effectively backed up by the fervent, energetic rhythms of ska, the sound of the era in which much of it was recorded. Concentrating on their most productive period (between 1966 when Toots was released from jail on a cannabis ...
Talk about high concept: Dub Side of the Moon features the house band of noted New York reggae label Easy Star covering Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon in the same sequence and in recognisable but reggae fashion. Here, the All Stars turn Floyd's strangely surreal world even stranger and more surreal, adorning the band's dark psychedelic music with slow reggae beats and ...