A Message to You Rudy

For some reason, I just want to post this awesome video from The Specials, one of the best ska bands ever!



There are actually two memories that I always connect to The Specials and ska.

The first is from when I was a junior in high school, and our English teacher asked everyone in the class to name different types of music, just to see how many we could put up on the blackboard. All the usual suspects came flying out, from rock, rap, reggae, country, western ("We got both kinds, Country and Western!"), folk, etc. etc., which also included all the various flavors of rock 'n' roll: rockabilly, classic rock, big hair rock, heavy metal, speed metal, death metal, etc.

As the class generally wound down from everyone trying to out-do each other with the different types of rock, I offered up one word: Ska! You would have thought I was speaking in a different tongue by the reaction from the rest of the class. People laughed at me, saying ska wasn't even a word, much less a type of music. To which, at the time, I could only lamely say that it was the combination of rock, jazz and reggae. When they laughed even more, all I could offer up was that The Police sang ska. That shut them up a little, since most kids at the time idolized Sting and The Police.

"Stop your messin' around..."

My second memory is of seeing The Specials play live in Las Vegas back in 1998, the last time I visited there. I was actually in Vegas for Red Flag; every so often, they let the Herk guys come in and fly a few missions, just to give the fighter pukes the opportunity to "shoot" slow-moving targets. (Very slow-moving!) The week before The Specials came to town, I scalped my way into the sold-out concert by the Brian Setzer Orchestra at the Hard Rock casino. This was at the height of the swing revival, and those tickets were hard to come by! People were all dressed up in Zoot Suits and poodle skirts, and it was a rocking good time to see people try to swing dance when the floor was that crowded! The only bad thing about the BSO show was that some of the people crowding the floor were really there just to be seen at the "popular" event. They weren't fans of the music as much as they were trend-spotting and trying to be hip.

Well, as much fun as I had seeing the Brian Setzer Orchestra play live, it was nothing compared to seeing The Specials play live! I'm sure they no longer had their entire complement of original band members by then. The tickets were much easier to buy, and in fact the crowd was probably half that of the BSO show. But everyone who was there to see The Specials play was truly a die-hard ska fan, and I remember taking a break from dancing just to see several hundred heads all bobbing in time to the music in unison! That was an awesome sight! We had so much more fun at The Specials' show.

"Better think of your future... else you'll wind up in jail..."

93.5 The Source - Classic Alternative (?)

Not too long ago, one of the radio stations in my area changed its format, as terrestrial radio stations often do. I have no idea if this was in response to dismal market ratings (how do they get those listener inputs, anyway? I get the concept behind a Neilsen set-top box recording what a person watches on TV, but how do you faithfully record a person's radio habits?), or if it was part of an ownership change or some other station format shakeup happening around the same time. All of those things are distinct possibilities.

The radio station itself is now known as 93.5 The Source - CU's Original Classic Alternative. You can see a little of what they used to be just in the URL, btw.

Now, when this switch first happened (or, more correctly, when I first realized it by stumbling through the radio dial), I was flat-out ecstatic! I called my sister, who has always had strong alternative radio programming in her local market, when 93.5 was playing Devo's "Working in a Coalmine," which I can't recall ever getting significant airplay, even back in the day. Sure, when I was growing up, Casey Kasem was countin' 'em down on the Billboard Top 40 every Sunday, and we didn't dare miss that. At the time, I thought we were being radical and subversive by listening to early Police albums up in our stuffy attic during the summer months. I know!

During my formative years of high school and college, I of course went through a Classic Rock phase (doesn't everyone?), followed by the Big Hair Band phase of the late '80s and early '90s (can anyone else top seeing Joan Jett play a free concert in downtown Dayton, OH, plus concerts by Lita Ford, Warrant, Trixter, and Firehouse? Oh, and Spinal Tap, for good measure), followed by Grunge and Alternative in the early- to mid-'90s.

So, the fact that a local radio station is now playing music that I really, really liked from about 15-25 years ago is a huge bonus for me! They reach back to the early '80s Pop, New Wave, Ska, and post-Punk genres, too. Every once in a while, they'll even throw in a song by those three white Jewish kids from Brooklyn, just to cover all bases. So far, no Dead Kennedys, but they do play "Punk Rock Girl" by the Dead Milkmen. All of which is a real treat to find on regular radio. As I told my sister, this is the kind of stuff I put on my iPod! Perhaps the best part was the lack of commercials during the early months after the format switch.

But I did get to thinking: how much that is recorded by bands today should be played by a "Classic Alternative" radio station? I'm specifically thinking of a recent song like "Pork & Beans" by Weezer. Weezer, of course, is grandfathered by the work they did during the early '90s alt music scene. If Social D were to record a new album, I'm sure it would get air time. How about U2? They've been around so long, they often pop up on classic rock stations. New material by Sting? He's in the same boat. Speaking of the Beasties, they're still recording new material... I think. What about Moby? New stuff by Duran Duran? I'm sure there are a million examples that could be thrown out there.

It's an interesting question, and one that's worth further debate. On a related sidebar, I loved the ***John Cusack movie reference alert!*** film "High Fidelity," where they often riffed on top ten lists of music-related things like this. So, this could be a top ten list of artists that deserve to be grandfathered into a Classic Alternative radio playlist. Or the top ten artists that should NOT be grandfathered. Either way works. Thoughts?