― Tom, Monday, 15 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
i have no idea when it started to go wrong. probably about the time it started to mate with punk? (operation ivy and its bastard spawn rancid are probably responsible for a fair number of sub-sub-sub-sub skacore bands currently choking the vfw hall circuit.) i used to love it. now i couldn't be arsed to put a ska record on (possible exceptions, the first specials alb, madness if you really think of them as ska) if you paid me.
search: early 60s ska from the motherland...most of the great reggae and dub artists have their roots in ska (pun unintended.) soul jazz has been putting out fabulous comps. of various jamaican music for a while now. also, two tone - specials, madness, english beat, selecter.
destroy: everything from 1983 on.
― jess, Monday, 15 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― chaki, Monday, 15 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
Because it was made by party-loving West Indians in the Sixties and pissed off British proles in the late seventies/early eighties.
And where did it all go wrong?
Because it started being made by Boston frat-boy assholes (here's lookin' at you, Mighty Mighty Lame Butt-tones) and spoiled-brat Orange County, California skateboard-chickenshits (ahem! Sublime).
― Tadeusz Suchodolski, Monday, 15 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― Bobby D. Gray, Monday, 15 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
Search: The 100-200-300-400-500% Dynamite comps that come out every so often. Great mix of all reggeae genres (Ska, Dub, Roots, Dancehall).
I tend to think ska (and reggae in general) all went wrong when it fell into the hands of the US-based white middle class college fratboy set. Reggae/Ska's dancable accessability+association with gettin' high makes it an easy target for watered down rip off white rasta trustafarians who watch 'half-baked' after band practice. P>
― turner, Tuesday, 16 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― Simon, Tuesday, 16 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
It went wrong with Madness.
― Alacrán, Tuesday, 16 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― m jemmeson, Tuesday, 16 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― Mark M, Tuesday, 16 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― jk, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― Sterling Clover, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― ambrose, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― m jemmeson, Wednesday, 17 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
ska = Jamaican polka. And polka = Slovak rock. Hence, its attraction to Slavs (such as my relatives in Poland I visited six years ago, though the Poles seem to have snapped outta it and are recently responsible for a good batch of death metal -- Sto Lat! ).
― Tadeusz Suchodolski, Thursday, 18 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― m jemmeson, Thursday, 18 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
Come to one of the beer-soaked jock-rock fests passed off as ska around here and you'll never find a more joyless, sad experience. Especially when those fuckers in the Bosstones are involved.
― Ned Raggett, Friday, 19 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
― Sterling Clover, Friday, 19 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
There are only like 5 references to Bim Skala Bim on ILX, but I've heard one of their songs twice as background music for cable tv shows. First in an emeril green segment on salads, then last night on a travel channel segment about the world's largest halloween store in worcester, ma.I haven't listened to it in ages, but I used to rep pretty heavily for their live album.
― kingkongvsgodzilla, Monday, 19 October 2009 10:32 (fourteen years ago) link
fsr photo of my hs ska band in this buzzfeed article 23 things that totally made you ska kid in high school http://www.buzzfeed.com/ryanhatesthis/23-things-that-totally-made-you-ska-kid-in-high-school
― flopson, Monday, 25 February 2013 05:14 (eleven years ago) link
oh we postin about our hs ska bands here?
I went to my folks house in February to look at the Super Bowl with them, and my mom had put the contents of their VHS/DVD collection into a box and tasked me with reviewing it and choosing what wouldn't be destroyed for eternity. I couldn't not save a professionally-reproduced DVD that our Peruvian Mormon Trumpet Player's mom had made of our rad Aquabats-style anti-communist multi-racial themed ska-core band that took 2nd place at the 1998 Battle of the Bands and I'm proud to say FIRST PLACE at the 1999 Battle of the Bands, an honor legitimized by a $200 cash reward and a formal opportunity for us to play on the campus's outdoor stage during lunch a few weeks before graduation (we covered Less Than Jake, it was 1999).
anyway here's the back of the DVD (thumbs 1-3 are the ska band's opening band, which was the Peruvian Mormon Trumpet Player's sub-band consisting of three members of the main band, where he played piano and the ska band's drummer and singer backed him up on drums and bass, respectively. We covered Ben Folds, it was 1999)
https://i.imgur.com/N5zSHEN.jpg
― the burrito that defined a generation, Thursday, 27 August 2020 05:10 (three years ago) link
i was playing a pearl export kit with cheap paiste cymbals in a 7-piece HS ska band around those years. i salute you!
― davey, Thursday, 27 August 2020 09:01 (three years ago) link
i played trumpet in a ska band in HS too, we were called the 'skaskank redemption'. gawd. the best day of the band's life was when streetlight manifesto played in our small town in wisconsin for some reason
i always associate wisconsin and new jersey with high school ska bands
― global tetrahedron, Thursday, 27 August 2020 16:19 (three years ago) link
do I wanna go see Less Than Jake and Bowling For Soup when they're touring together here pretty soon?
seems kinda fun, right? or ...
note: i have never been a fan of either band or ska, but am feeling open to this.
― alpine static, Tuesday, 2 August 2022 19:40 (one year ago) link
following up on my own question...I had *zero* idea which band was "bigger" and/or headlining, so I looked at Spotify monthly listeners:
Less Than Jake: 797,068Bowling For Soup: 3,065,902
it's certainly not a perfect way to measure, but does that feel right?! is BFS really 3 to 4 times bigger than LTJ?
― alpine static, Saturday, 27 August 2022 21:42 (one year ago) link