Sunday, October 2, 2022

va Banana Hits (2003)

1 Bang Matu & Orquestra Kingston - Autumn Leaves

2 Corey Dixon & the Zvooks - Since I Left

3 Court Jester's Crew - Have You Seen My Girl?

4 Dr. Green - Sienos

5 Dr. Ring Ding and the Senior All-Stars - Fever

6 Fidel Castro - Skazska O Ska

7 Intensified - Ransom

8 King Django - Life Boat

9 Karavana - Kudzi Chlap

10 Laurel Aitken with Court Jester's Crew - Cockroach

11 Lord Kaya and the Kukumakasticks - When I Call Your Name

12 Not So Fast - Kazdego Dnia

13 Psico Rude Boys del Espacio Exterior - Lady Jane Silver

14 Skarpeta - Psycho Billy

15 Skatoon Syndikat - Ein Abend Wie Du und Ich

16 La Maglietta dei Purple Hearts - Smodati

17 Smoke Like a Fish - The Price

18 Spicy Roots - Love Like Music

19 The Splitters - Look Away

20 Skatoons - Die Grosse Liebe

21 Yellow Umbrella - Candela

22 Skunk - EtorDaitezela


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Fool Moon - Turn to Me 7" (1981)

 

Rare California ska/reggae with a horrible fake Jamaican accent. 

The band is called Fool Moon but the band's spearhead and vocalist put his name and face all over the record. If you don't know who Brad Dupont is then you're just ignorant.

I'm ignorant too. I don't know who the fuck he is. But his self-promotion game in 1981 was as good as it gets.  


A - Turn to Me

B - King of the Mountain

 

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Saturday, September 3, 2022

Alaska - Alaska (demo tape 1994)

 There are at least three ska bands called Alaska. There is the French-Canadian band and the more popular Swiss band. Then there is this band from Helsinki Finland.

They released this demo tape in 1994. Four tracks of early 90s 2Tone inspired instrumental ska. 

1 Sherwood Ska

2 Ta-Ta

3 Get Into...

4 The Bold and the Ska


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va On Your Mark...Get Set...GO! (1998)

 1 The Allentons - Suppie

2 Checkmate - Prodigal Son

3 Mobtown - The Rhythm of Ska

4 Yeska - Dance Cleopatra

5 Irie Beats - Irie Blues

6 The Allentons - Fallen

7 The Adjustments - Cautious

8 Melting Pot - Time to Change

9 Red Session - Tale of the Toothless One

10 The Derringers - Yeah Yeah Yeah

11 The 11th Hour Band - It Could Be

12 The Adjustments - Spinning My Wheels

13 Melting Pot - Buddhafro

14 Jeffries Fan Club - Something Good

15 Bank of Brian - Highest Jungle Gym

16 The Iron-Ons - Ted

17 My Superhero - Coley & Steve

18 Action League - If You Were Me

19 The Alcoskalics - The Bus Never Comes

20 4-Gazm - She's My

 

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Mentone Tones - Are We There Yet? (1998)

 This should be a great rare ska album - every song is third-wave ska with the exception of that one reggae song and that one jazzy tune with the fake Louis Armstrong vocals; overall the vocals are not the snotty/bratty vocals that contaminated the scene in those days - they're actually good vocals; the horn section is awesome; the band doesn't sound like amateurs at all. Great performance on every song. Great song writing...

...but...

 This is one of those "Christian" ska releases that have very little to do with Christianity aside from Jesus idolatry. This release has more Jesus per second than most other Christian ska albums. Jesus, Jesus, I-Love-Jesus. Not Biblical Jesus, but 90s pop culture Jesus. But it is quite rare. And it's a great 3rd wave ska album if you play it in the background and don't focus too much on the lyrics.

1 My Heart Beats to Serve You

2 Everyday Praise Song

3 Lukewarm Java Juice

4 Are We There Yet?

5 Unchanging

6 Re-Knew

7 Don't Mess with Mentone

8 Death, Poison, Snake, Riot!

9 Stressing

10 Matt's Been Zapped!


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Monday, August 29, 2022

Midnight Sun - Midnight Sun (1994)

 Midnight Sun is a reggae/ska/calypso band that formed in the late 80s near San Francisco California. They are still playing live to this day (check their Facebook page for their latest shows) but they are now using the name Midnight Sun Massive.

They released an EP in 1994 called "Touch" that you can hear on their ReverbNation page along with lots of other songs including my favorite "Life as We Know It".

"Life as we Know It" made it on their 2008 album "Sunrise" that's available on Amazon.  All of their previous releases were under the name Midnight Sun but they used the name Midnight Sun Massive for their 2015 album "Who's Feeling Irie?" that you can listen to on Youtube. 

 

You can also hear them play live on their own YouTube channel. 

This tape here is a collection of songs recorded between 1989 and 1996. 

1 Morning Light

2 Thanks & Praises

3 Trinity

4 Ooo La La


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Sunday, August 14, 2022

Apollo 7 - Apollo 7 demo (1992)


 Rare British ska. This is my own rip and scans from my own tape. The quality isn't great but it's the best I can do. Lots of hiss and just bad sound quality altogether. The tape wasn't made very well. 

1 Apollo

2 Espionage

3 Mr. Policeman

4 Concrete Jungle


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Thursday, August 11, 2022

The Trespassers - The Adventures of Los Bandeleros (1999)

 These are the guys who did that great song "Gonna Get It, Nazi Punks" that was on Skarmageddon 3 and a few other compilations in the mid 90s. That version was from their demo tape which I do not have and I have never heard. The song is on this album but it's a re-recording. I prefer the original.


1 Riot at the Dancehall

2 Man Eater

3 Lonely Boy

4 Is There One?

5 The Disrupter

6 Come Correct

7 Gonna Get It!

8 La Casa Blanca

9 What Happened to You?

10 Anarchy in America

11 Roots Style

12 The End of Time

13 Come Correct (Edit)


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Wednesday, August 10, 2022

Friday, July 29, 2022

The Sages

 The Sages was a band from Connecticut. I assume they are from Hartford but I don't know for sure. As far as I know they only released one album but they had a demo tape before they recorded the album and even though the album is full of ska/reggae influences the tape is almost strictly ska/reggae. 

There's a noticeable Police vibe but when I first heard the beginning of the song "Follow the Money" it reminded me of the Stewart Copeland/Stan Ridgway song "Don't Box Me In". Stewart Copeland was (is?) the drummer for the Police and Stan Ridgway was the singer for Wall of Voodoo (Mexican Radio - not to be confused with Gruppo Sportivo's impeccable cover). They collaborated on a song for the soundtrack to Rumblefish.  


The Sages - The Sages demo tape (1990)

1 Follow the Money

2 More the Things You do

3 Please be Near

4 What do You got to Prove?

5 Down by Law

6 Tomorrow Begins Today

7 College Radio


The Sages - Back from Nowhere (1992)

1 Back from Nowhere

2 Follow the Money

3 Felt & Heard

4 42b

5 Cold Silence

6 The Hunter

7 The Angels

8 Sounds of a City

9 Elvis (You did the Right Thing)

10 Whatever Gets You Through Your Day

11 Bustin' Deep

12 Down by Law

13 Hostile Heart

14 College Radio

 



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******************************************


Speaking of Wall of Voodoo, if you don't have that first EP and the first two albums you're really missing out. But Stan Ridgway was more than Wall of Voodoo. He has done a million solo albums. After a time he drifted into what most would call 'country' but he has some amazing tunes from his early years as a solo artist. After working with Stewart Copeland he didn't do anything ska/reggae but there is one song with that influence. 


As you know when Stan Ridgway left Wall of Voodoo they continued on without him and his weird voice but it just didn't work and they broke up not long after they fulfilled their record contract but they did release a couple albums in that time with their new singer Andy Prieboy and, although I really prefer their stuff with Stan, they did release one of my all-time favorite songs "Far Side of Crazy". The lyrics of this song are based on a poem written by John Hinckley Jr. -  the guy who shot Ronald Reagan. Hinckley has since been released from prison and he fancies himself as a sort of rock star.


Here are my top five Stan Ridgway moments I think everybody must know:

Wall of Voodoo - Lake of Fire (...and I'm your host Ramsey Lewis. Thank you...)

Wall of Voodoo - Call Box 123

Wall of Voodoo - Tomorrow (live at the Us Festival) In fact their entire performance at the Us Festival is solid gold.

Stan Ridgway - The Big Heat

Stan Ridgway - Camoflauge

...and then there's "Lost Weekend". Aside from the fact that my wife has never smoked a cigarette in her life every second of this song tells our story. We got married at the Drive Through Chapel of Love in Las Vegas when we were evacuated from our home during a historically bad fire. On the drive from Vegas in my 1987 primer grey Dodge Diplomat we didn't really know where we were going so we did nothing but listen to music and talk about our plans about how we could make money. It was sad times. It was great times. This song hits so close to home.  She sat in the back seat reading a book. When I heard that in this song I was blown away. This song is about us but it was recorded 20 years before we met.

Tuesday, July 19, 2022

va Rat-Sharp Ska (2005)

  This is a German ska compilation that has many tracks that you can't find anywhere else. Many of these bands have not released anything outside of this CD. 

1 The Incredible Derrick - Caribbean Nights

2 Skin Ya Teet - Godfather of SKA

3 Essentials - Work Song

4 Brass Monkeys - On Your Own

5 Reefer Madness - Rise Up

6 The Bluebeat Remedy - Rise Up

7 Bulletproof Kitchen - Skapunk im GepÀck

8 Skapa Flow - Slightness

9 Big Banders - Make Your Choice

10 Skaprifischer - Porque Te Vas

11 Surfits - Pool Party Supreme

12 Kescher - Angelina

13 Me In The Bucket - The Chase Scene

14 Ska-Wars - Advice

15 Bad Shakyn' - Rock My Day

16 SanitÀtskasten AG - Stichpunkt Vinyl

17 The Nicks - Sunday Stripper

18 Going Commando - Bam Bam Gigalo

19 The Quicksteps - Through & Through

20 K-Mob - Fistful of Satisfaction

21 The Skatoons - TschĂŒss

22 Outro 


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Thursday, July 14, 2022

Saxawhaman

 The first time I heard of the French band Saxawhaman was on the first "Skankin' 'Round the World" compilation with the song Le Robot. I'm willing to bet that's when you first heard the name too. In those days it was easy to find out information about every band on that compilation except for this band. When I first started exploring the internet this is one of the bands I was looking for but I never found anything about them.

Thankfully Discogs came along and I could, at least, know what else they recorded which eventually revealed that they released very little. 

The band later changed their name to Les Saxas and they released even less. Officially Les Saxas only ever put out two songs for the good people of the world. The song Chez Fefer from the "Vive le Ska" compilation from 1989 and the song Gueule De Bois which was not released as an audio track but on a video called Bar'ouffs from 1990 that was only released on VHS - probably Region 2 which means that American VCRs wouldn't have been able to play the tape. (NTSC as opposed to PAL) but, despite that, I have included the song in this download. 

 

The music offered in this download is a lot of incredible rare pieces of ska history but the sound quality of these tracks are not very good. If you are a casual ska fan you might want to skip this one but if you are a true skarcheologist (I forget who coined this term many years ago, but I thank them!) you will really appreciate this post. 

 

 Saxawhaman - Maquette* (demo tape recorded on the 11th of April, 1986)

1 Fuera de la Lei

2 Midnight Madness

3 Sweet Honey Moon on My Blue Bird


Saxawhaman - Saxawhaman* (demo tape from 1987 with re-recorded versions of two songs from the first demo tape)

1 Zombie's Night

2 Fuera de la Lei

3 Sweet Honey Moon on My Blue Bird


This, and the song Le Robot, is all I have by this band aside from a few live songs I found on YouTube:

*Fuera de la Lei (live)

*White Man (live) - Clash cover

*La Bamba (yes, this is a cover too - Richie Valens - but you knew that)



And then I threw in the first song that Les Saxas played the first time they played live. It's an instrumental and I don't know what the title of the song is. I stole it from YouTube. 

Then there are these three Les Saxas songs

*Chez Fefer

*Guele de Bois (from the VHS tape)

*Saint Kemar


They actually do have other songs floating around out there but I don't have them. If anybody does, please let me know.


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*For the record I do own these original cassettes and I am willing to part with them. If you need to own these artifacts - these museum pieces of ska history - let me know. We'll talk.


Friday, July 1, 2022

MĂŒllerbeat

 This was a German ska band that had some noticeable influence from The Police but their overall sound - especially the vocals - is very much comparable to Fischer Z. 

MĂŒllerbeat - Don't Call Me MĂŒller (1992)

1 Call Me MĂŒller

2 Shelter

3 Home

4 Outside the Door

5 Big Girl

6 Love on the 2nd Floor

7 The World is Too Big

8 Better Side of Me

9 1000 Words

10 It's Alright

11 No Care

12 Mackintosh

13 Night


 MĂŒllerbeat - Jig 'n' Jostle (demo tape 1990)

1 Experts

2 The Earth is Round

3 Hometown

4 Love on the 2nd Floor

5 Just Look Around

6 1000 Words

7 (This is a) Song About

8 The World is Too

9 Big Girl

10 Outside the Door

11 untitled

12 untitled 




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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


Since we're on the subject of Fischer Z I must say that I am really a big fan. I have just about all of their music. It should be noted that one of their earliest releases was a ska-inspired song - The Worker - and they maintained a bit of a ska influence throughout their long history as a band. 

At one point there was a dispute between the band and the record label so the band renamed itself The Cry and their first release under the new name was a ska song called Take It Round Again.

 For my American friends I have to explain that the name "Fischer Z" is pronounced "fischer zed" or, more appropriately "Fishes Head".

 John Watts is a clever man and great song writer with as great unique voice. Watch this video where he explains the story behind The Worker. 


Wednesday, June 29, 2022

Septic Tank Disasters - You've Got STDs (2004)

 

1 Ghost Track

2 Boredom

3 Skambo #5

4 Trouble in Paradise

5 South America

6 Million Dollar Idea

7 Fraud

8 Evil Son

9 Hometown

10 Message in a Bottle


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Sunday, June 26, 2022

The Ventilators - Live Demo Tape (1992)

 

This is another tape that I do not own because nobody owns this one. It was never released. Thankfully a YouTube channel posted it and I respectfully stole it to share it with you. They also have the other Ventilators demo tape called"Ska" that I previously posted HERE and it has the correct titles. There were no titles listed on the tape or card so I had to guess and I got a couple wrong. I've been meaning to update the tracks on Discogs. That channel is called Radio Skamachine and they also have some other rare Ventilators live recordings.

 

1 Saddle Up

2 Take Me Away

3 Jean's Theme 1

4 Cha War

5 Jean's Theme 2 (Flying Saucer)

6 Rude Boys

7 Remembrance

8 Meteors

9 Johnny be Good

10 Brand New Lover

11 Matt's Theme

12 Political

13 You're Wondering Now

 

 

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Wednesday, June 22, 2022

The Skandals - Alive with Pleasure (1996)

 This band was from Milwaukee, Wisconsin and this is probably the only thing they ever released. This is (I'm guessing) a demo tape but it was professionally made with a printed shell and the quality of the music is a superior product for a demo tape. 

I like a lot of these old ska and ska/punk tapes for the novelty factor of me having actually been there and knowing what these bands sound like live but I know it doesn't translate very well to people these days who weren't there and have nothing but a hissy tape to prove these bands existed, but this one stands out above most of the others to me.

With that in mind I want you to compare any of those other old ska demo tapes with this one. Can you agree that this band was a little more advanced than most of the others? The songwriting? The lyrics? The musicianship? 

They have their flaws, I'm not going to lie, but I really wish they had done more.

I'm impressed.

1 Minute Woe Milk*

2 Sport Bowl 39

3 Assembly Line**

4 Amnesia

5 Morning

6 Face the Music


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*The title on the tape is Minute Woe Milk but Cullen James, who was in the band, posted this song on his YouTube channel*** with the title Minute Lube Milk. I can't imagine what the real title is. 

**The song Assembly Line appeared on the 1998 compilation "American Skathic 4".


***His YouTube channel is where I respectfully stole all of these songs from. I don't have my own copy of this tape.


Saturday, June 18, 2022

Beat Fetish - Is It Time? (1992)

 This was a ska/rock band from Albuquerque who released this cassette-only mini album in 1992. The first side, in fact, the first five songs are ska or ska-inspired. The last two songs are a little too "Hootie and the Blowfish" for my taste. 

I'm not really a big fan of hippie music - especially pop-hippie music (but I do have my favorites - I can listen to Jimi but I can't hear Jimi - I get it) so I don't really waste too many seconds of my life listening to Steve Miller's song "The Joker". I know a lot of people like it and they are entitled to their own weird opinion. The only popular song from this era that I dislike more than The Joker is American Pie. "I drove my Chevy to the levy but the levy was dry"?? Who wrote this? A drunk toddler? 

Anyway, I'm saying this because this tape has a cover of The Joker that I actually like. I'm a hard sell for this kind of thing but I give it my approval. I'll allow it. 

At least it's not Woolly Bully.

 Again. 

Ska bands need to leave Woolly Bully alone and, at least once, I'd like to hear a ska band cover another Sam The Sham and the Pharaohs song like "VooDoo Doll"

 

But I digress. 

 

1 It Is Time

2 Feed the War

3 I'm at Home

4 The Joker

5 Just One Thing

6 Round & Round

7 Isolation Man


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Friday, June 17, 2022

Skaramouche - Never Ever Touch (2004)

 This is a band from Switzerland who only released this one album.

1 The Continuing Story of C.

2 Space Invaders

3 Dance the Night Away

4 Senseless

5 Don't Tell Me

6 Twenty

7 What's Come to be

8 Bungertwies


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Wednesday, June 15, 2022

Eleventh Hour Band

 This is one of those punk bands that played a lot of ska in their reportoire. They released two CDs that I know of but they probably have a demo tape out there somewhere. 


The Eleventh Hour Band - Flying Taco (1997)

1 Derevaun Seraun

2 Deep Pockets

3 Myself

4 Erin

5 Crazy People

6 We're all Freaks

7 Fall by the Wayside

8 Leave

9 Goat Milk

10 Yipee Dal Doo, Hootie Dah Dae

11 Nine Times Out of Ten


 

 Eleventh Hour Band - The Eleventh Hour Band (1999)

1 Unfriendly

2 Another Day

3 Better than Them

4 Come Alive

5 Superstar

6 D.U.I.

7 In My Dreams

 8 Piece of My Soul


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