Our third posting features the music of the Two-Tone ska revival of the late 1970s/early 1980s - the essence of sharpness in dark times at 45rpm. The main poem comes from Jeff Dawson aka Jeffarama.
Read down for a link to a BBC 2021 documentary The Sound of Coventry about the record label, a selection of Two-Tone’s greatest tracks, and a short elegy for much-missed Specials frontman Terry Hall, who died in 2022.
Two Tone Clash!
Burning Britain
Tensions high
Bonfires burning
Tinderbox night
Inner cities simmer
Residents hide
Police and youths
Hate and fights
It's like a Ghost Town
The Two Tone cry
Dark days of '81
Smoke fills the sky
Concrete jungles
No-go zones after dark
But dance floors throbbed
With the sound of Ska
Caribbean Calypso
With a Jamaican beat
Ethnicky Jazz
Down every street
The Specials, Madness
The Selecter and The Beat
Gangsters and The Prince
Turning up the heat
Old Trojan vinyl
Playing so loud
The great Prince Far-I
Would be so proud
Rocky steady Reggae
Sounds systems blast
R n' B skanks
A Two-Tone Clash!
Clash City Rockers
Westway to the world
Get out of the Rat Race
The story unfurled
White man in Hammersmith Palais
He knew the truth
London Calling
Guns on the Roof!
This is a message
From the Special AKA
We are the Rude Boys
Not the Special KKK!
Pork pie hats
Mohair suits
Punks and Skins
Back to their roots
Revolution Rock
Black and White Riot
Two Tone and Punk
Will never be quiet!
Jeff Dawson aka Jeffarama
Click below for the brilliant 2021 BBC documentary on the birth, life and legacy of Two-Tone Records.
Further reading from Classic Pop Magazine
Classic Pop's essential guide to the best of 2 Tone
POEM
Elegy for Terry Hall
How I wanted to be you, tonic suit
and sad eyes, playing Jerry's songs,
blank expressions of a hollow world.
The town has changed; you wouldn't
know it these days, not now that
your band don't play no more.
Andy Jackson