The Specials reissues
Uncut, May 2002
"This ain't a track, it's a movement," proclaim The Streets on their recent 2-step-meets-2-Tone tune 'Let's Push Things Forward'. There are songs so potently and provocatively original they do seem to demand the formation of a subculture around them. But 'Gangsters', the Specials' 1979 debut, has got to be one of the very few cases where this literally happened: seemingly overnight and out of nowhere, an entire scene of ska bands assembled itself in response.
That may not have been Jerry Dammers' masterplan, but he was consciously attempting to create a brand new sound. Having already tried to merge punk with contemporary roots reggae and come a cropper owing to the hard-to-bridge difference in tempo and feel, Dammers decided to wind back the clock to reggae's precursors, ska and rocksteady; their speedy pace and jerky rhythm guitar chops were more compatible with new wave angularity. 2-Tone arrived at just the right moment: the arty vanguard of post-punk (PiL, The Pop Group etc) was preoccupied with dub's spacey sound and apocalyptic dread, leaving a gap in the market for an uptempo and upful punky-reggae sound. Defined by trebly, 7-inch brevity rather than bass-heavy 12-inch expanse (a la Metal Box), 2-Tone was populist and radio-friendly, yet its black-white hybridity and mixed-race bands were a perfect fit with the progressive RAR politics of the day.
For all its outward appearance of fun and energy, though, what's striking about The Specials is how grim the music's world view mostly is — a stance of sullen disaffection embodied in singer Terry Hall's unblinking eyes and perpetual scowl. Songs like 'Too Much Too Young' (a venomous diatribe addressed to an ex-girlfriend who's lost her youth to early motherhood) and 'Concrete Jungle' (a snapshot of '79 street life, a boom year for racial attacks and random violence) recall the desolate monochrome vistas and dosed-off options depicted in Sixties social realist films like Saturday Night And Sunday Morning and Kes.
Grey was always simultaneously The Specials' forte and fault — those lugubrious trombones! From its colour cover (featuring some band members actually smiling!) to its new sonic flavours (Dammers had become infatuated with muzak). More Specials was a bid to move forward and leave behind the legion of clones. Elvis Costello's sparse, near-mono production on the debut aimed to capture the band's legendarily electric live performances; now Dammers had fallen in love with the studio, an ultimately ruinous passion.
It's easy to see why the pork pie massive were puzzled and pissed off by the sudden depletion of energy on More Specials, but Dammers' new penchant for arrangement and production pays off with brilliant songs, like 'Stereotypes' (all Dr Zhivago-like balalaikas) and 'International Jet Set' (Casio-rhumba riddims and whirling Wurlitzer that stage the EZ listening revival 15 years ahead of schedule).
A Heaven's Gate-style financial calamity, 1984's In The Studio feels fatally sapped by its protracted gestation (three years, hence the album's wry title). Although Hall's only writing credit on the first two albums was More Specials' nuclear armageddon-themed 'Man At C&A', a crucial proportion of the band's spirit — its bleak, black humour — seems to have disappeared when he left for Fun Boy Three along with Neville Staple and Lynval Golding. Apart from the sinuous-melodied, mischievous 'What I Like Most About You Is Your Girlfriend', the dominant mood is sanctimonious, especially the GLC-friendly protest-pop singles 'Racist Friend' and 'War Crimes'. In The Studio sounds literally studious, a series of meticulous and joy-drained genre exercises, sedate and sedative.
The wounds of class
"Nothing ever change..."
For the longest while, 2-Tone seemed like a sealed-off pocket in Britpop time: it vaporised as abruptly as it arrived, leaving little legacy apart from America's ill-advised ska-revival revival. But echoes pop up in the oddest places. Samples from 'Monkey Man' and 'Friday Night, Saturday Morning' graced underground rave anthems by Bodysnatch and 4 Hero. Tricky is a huge admirer of Terry Hall, and had him guest on the Nearly God album. Dammers' film score-steeped, sepia-toned sound circa More Specials and 'Ghost Town' is an unacknowledged precursor to Portishead circa 'Sour Times'. And there's a definite ska feel that crops up repeatedly in 2-step garage, from Doolally's 'Straight From The Heart' in 1998 to this year's 'Too Much Brandy' and 'Push Things Forward' by The Streets. 2-Tone's mood-blend of jaunty and glum — a dancefloor hemmed in by desperation on all sides — has perennial appeal and resonance.
