The first wave of Ska developed in the early 1960s in Jamaica. The Jamaicans heard the sound of new Orleans R&B being broadcast over the radio and decided to combine elements of Caribbean music and calypso with jazz and rhythm and blues. Some of the most influential ska musicians include the Skatalites, Prince Buster and Rico Rodriguez.
“Slimmer down” by the Skatalites is a strong and good example of ska music
In the late 1970s, new bands in Britain took the fundamentals of Ska and combined it with the energy and feel of punk. The specials were seen as the leading group of the second wave of Ska. They formed their own independent record label called 2-tone which became the name most commonly used for this genre of music. It was founded and led by jerry Dammers. Two Tone offered musicians a good chance to start their music career by letting them release one single and then move on to a different label. Many of the major 2nd wave ska bands were featured on 2-tone records like Madness, the Beat, and Selecter
Although Two Tone was seen as being fun and new it also became a major commentary on the society and the politics of the time and featured inter racial bands which was a bold statement at the time. The Beats song “stand down Margaret” had a clear and strong message about how they felt about the politics of the time. “Too much too young” by the specials was about teen pregnancy and has deep lyrical meaning. Some 2-tone bands sing about their influences and the roots of ska. They use phrases such as “rude boy” which was used as nickname for youth in Jamaica who had no jobs and were wasting their time, but later the phrase “rude boy” was giving to youths who displayed a certain coolness and style. The body snatchers Single was called “let’s do the rock steady” which was a reference to a genre which was heavily influenced ska music. Madness’s first single “the prince” was a dedication to prince buster who was regarded as an important figure in the history of ska music and influenced many ska musicians. However some two tone bands did not have any meaning behind their lyrics and were all about having fun, like bad manners.
In the pictures below you can see the similarities of the images of the first ska wave band “the Skatalites” and the 2-tone band “the Specials”. There are quite a lot of members in the band because of all of the instruments used in ska. Each band seems to be quite smartly dressed and have suits on. The differences is that 2-tone bands are more multiracial but that was because of the society of Britain at the time
Two Tone
As you can see in many of the 2-tone music videos, The bands had a punk energy and were dancing and jumping around pretty much all the way through the songs. This energy can be shown in the video below which is “lip up fatty” by bad manners
Two Tone included strong characteristics from the first ska wave. The brass section played the main melody lines; the guitars played heavily accented offbeat rhythms. The tempo was much faster in two tones than first wave ska, which gave it more of a punk feel. There are a lot of vocal harmonies and a lot of repeated vocal lines, sometimes the vocals have lots of delay, and this is also commonly used in the first wave of ska. The bass usually played a walking bass line. The drums are normally simple beats and don’t include any complicated rhythms. The song structures were usually simple and included a lot of repeated sections. A good example of these elements in two tones is “a message to you Rudy” by the specials
Two tones went on to influence and inspire the 3rd wave of Ska which was mainly based in United States in the late 1980s. Many third wave bands like reel big fish, Mighty Mighty Bosstones and the toasters kept many of the features from the 1st and 2nd waves of Ska, like heavily accented offbeat rhythms and strongly characterised by brass instruments but the 3rd wave focused more on the music than the message behind the lyrics. Many of the third wave bands had great commercial success and some of them featured in motion pictures and became soundtracks for the movies
For example, reel big fish’s cover of “take on me” was the main track to the movie Baseketball
Ska has been fused with many different genres and come back refined so many times. There is a high chance that a new wave of Ska will be heading our way in the future.
links
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O9HyXc4e7Qc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F6fQnTyEniM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ofq7sCDuhGo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GqlzVeq1S0o
http://skascene.webs.com/SKATA.jpg
http://justwilliam1959.files.wordpress.com/2009/03/specials-pole.jpg
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