The Specials
The Specials, also known as The Special AKA, were an English 2 tone and ska revival band formed in 1977 in Coventry. After some early changes, the first stable lineup of the group consisted of Terry Hall and Neville Staple on vocals, Jerry Dammers on keyboards, Lynval Golding and Roddy Radiation on guitars, Horace Panter on bass, John Bradbury on drums, and Dick Cuthell and Rico Rodriguez on horns. The band wore mod-style "1960s period rude boy outfits ( pork pie hats, tonic and mohair suits and loafers)". Their music combines the danceable rhythms of ska and rocksteady with the energy and attitude of punk. Lyrically, their work (often written by primary songwriter Dammers) presented overt political and social commentary. In 1980, their ''The Special AKA Live!'' EP, featuring lead track "Too Much Too Young", reached No. 1 on the UK Singles Chart. In 1981, the recession-themed single "Ghost Town" also hit No. 1 in the UK. After seven consecutive UK top 10 singles b ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Coventry
Coventry ( or ) is a city in the West Midlands, England. It is on the River Sherbourne. Coventry has been a large settlement for centuries, although it was not founded and given its city status until the Middle Ages. The city is governed by Coventry City Council. Formerly part of Warwickshire until 1451, Coventry had a population of 345,328 at the 2021 census, making it the tenth largest city in England and the 12th largest in the United Kingdom. It is the second largest city in the West Midlands region, after Birmingham, from which it is separated by an area of green belt known as the Meriden Gap, and the third largest in the wider Midlands after Birmingham and Leicester. The city is part of a larger conurbation known as the Coventry and Bedworth Urban Area, which in 2021 had a population of 389,603. Coventry is east-south-east of Birmingham, south-west of Leicester, north of Warwick and north-west of London. Coventry is also the most central city in Englan ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Rico Rodriguez (musician)
Emmanuel "Rico" Rodriguez (17 October 1934 – 4 September 2015), also known as Rico, Reco or El Reco, was a Cuban-born Jamaican ska and reggae trombonist. He recorded with producers such as Karl Pitterson, Prince Buster, and Lloyd Daley. He was known as one of the first ska musicians. Beginning in the 1960s, he worked with The Members, The Specials, Jools Holland, and Paul Young. Career Rodriguez was born in Havana, Cuba, and at an early age moved with his family to Jamaica.Campbell, Howard (2012)Rico Rodriguez: Man From Wareika, ''Jamaica Observer'', 22 June 2012; retrieved 24 June 2012. He grew up there in Kingston, and was taught to play the trombone by his slightly older schoolmate Don Drummond at the Alpha Boys School. In the 1950s, Rodriguez became a Rastafarian and was closely associated musically to the rasta drummer Count Ossie. In 1961 Rodriguez moved to the UK, where he joined live bands such as Georgie Fame's Blue Flames [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Single (music)
In music, a single is a type of release, typically a song recording of fewer tracks than an LP record or an album. One can be released for sale to the public in a variety of formats. In most cases, a single is a song that is released separately from an album, although it usually also appears on an album. In other cases a recording released as a single may not appear on an album. Despite being referred to as a single, in the era of music downloads, singles can include up to as many as three tracks. The biggest digital music distributor, the iTunes Store, accepts as many as three tracks that are less than ten minutes each as a single. Any more than three tracks on a musical release or thirty minutes in total running time is an extended play (EP) or, if over six tracks long, an album. Historically, when mainstream music was purchased via vinyl records, singles would be released double-sided, i.e. there was an A-side and a B-side, on which two songs would appear, one on each ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Top 40
In the music industry, the Top 40 is the current, 40 most-popular songs in a particular genre. It is the best-selling or most frequently broadcast popular music. Record charts have traditionally consisted of a total of 40 songs. "Top 40" or "contemporary hit radio" is also a radio format. Frequent variants of the Top 40 are the Top 10, Top 20, Top 30, Top 50, Top 75, Top 100 and Top 200. History According to producer Richard Fatherley, Todd Storz was the inventor of the format, at his radio station KOWH in Omaha, Nebraska. Storz invented the format in the early 1950s, using the number of times a record was played on jukeboxes to compose a weekly list for broadcast. The format was commercially successful, and Storz and his father Robert, under the name of the Storz Broadcasting Company, subsequently acquired other stations to use the new Top 40 format. In 1989, Todd Storz was inducted into the Nebraska Broadcasters Association Hall of Fame. The term "Top 40", describing a radio ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Ghost Town (The Specials Song)
"Ghost Town" is a song by the British two-tone band the Specials, released on 12 June 1981. The song spent three weeks at number one and 10 weeks in total in the top 40 of the UK Singles Chart. Evoking themes of urban decay, deindustrialisation, unemployment and violence in inner cities, the song is remembered for being a hit at the same time as riots were occurring in British cities. Internal tensions within the band were also coming to a head when the single was being recorded, resulting in the song being the last single recorded by the original seven members of the group before splitting up. However, the song was hailed by the contemporary UK music press as a major piece of popular social commentary, and all three of the major UK music magazines of the time awarded "Ghost Town" the accolade of "Single of the Year" for 1981. It was the 12th-best-selling single in the UK in 1981. Background The tour for the group's '' More Specials'' album in autumn 1980 had been a fraught e ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
UK Singles Chart
The UK Singles Chart (currently titled Official Singles Chart, with the upper section more commonly known as the Official UK Top 40) is compiled by the Official Charts Company (OCC), on behalf of the British record industry, listing the top-selling Single (music), singles in the United Kingdom, based upon physical sales, paid-for downloads and music streaming, streaming. The Official Chart, broadcast on BBC Radio 1 and MTV (Official UK Top 40), is the UK music industry's recognised official measure of singles and albums popularity because it is the most comprehensive research panel of its kind, today surveying over 15,000 retailers and digital services daily, capturing 99.9% of all singles consumed in Britain across the week, and over 98% of albums. To be eligible for the chart, a Single (music), single is currently defined by the Official Charts Company (OCC) as either a 'single bundle' having no more than four tracks and not lasting longer than 25 minutes or one digital audio ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Extended Play
An extended play record, usually referred to as an EP, is a musical recording that contains more tracks than a single but fewer than an album or LP record.Official Charts Company , access-date=March 21, 2017 Contemporary EPs generally contain four or five tracks, and are considered "less expensive and time-consuming" for an artist to produce than an album. An EP originally referred to specific types of records other than 78 [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
The Special AKA Live!
''Too Much Too Young - The Special A.K.A. Live!'' is a live EP by The Specials with Rico Rodriguez, released on 11 January 1980. On the original release, the front cover credited the performers as ''The Special A.K.A. featuring Rico'', while the back cover mentions and the labels credited only The Specials. Renowned for their live shows, The Specials released a five-track live EP in January 1980 as the third single by the band. The EP featured "Too Much Too Young" (originally recorded on the album ''The Specials'') with " Guns of Navarone" recorded live in London; and "Skinhead Symphony" - a medley of "Long Shot Kick De Bucket", " The Liquidator" and " Skinhead Moonstomp" - which was recorded at Tiffany's in Coventry. Lead track "Too Much Too Young" was based on the 1969 song "Birth Control" by Lloyd Charmers. Contrary to what is sometimes stated, "Too Much Too Young" was not banned by the BBC due to mentions of contraception in the lyrics. However, when the song's promotional ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Rocksteady
Rocksteady is a music genre that originated in Jamaica around 1966. A successor of ska and a precursor to reggae, rocksteady was the dominant style of music in Jamaica for nearly two years, performed by many of the artists who helped establish reggae, including harmony groups such as the Techniques, the Paragons, the Heptones and the Gaylads; soulful singers such as Alton Ellis, Delroy Wilson, Bob Andy, Ken Boothe and Phyllis Dillon; musicians such as Jackie Mittoo, Lynn Taitt and Tommy McCook. The term ''rocksteady'' comes from a popular (slower) dance style mentioned in the Alton Ellis song "Rocksteady", that matched the new sound. Some rocksteady songs became hits outside Jamaica, as with ska, helping to secure the international base reggae music has today. Characteristics The Jamaican musicians and producers who developed the rocksteady sound and ska were well-versed in jazz and influenced by other genres, most notably rhythm and blues, and by Caribbean music plus African m ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
AllMusic
AllMusic (previously known as All-Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the database was first made available on the Internet in 1994. AllMusic is owned by RhythmOne. History AllMusic was launched as All-Music Guide by Michael Erlewine, a "compulsive archivist, noted astrologer, Buddhist scholar and musician". He became interested in using computers for his astrological work in the mid-1970s and founded a software company, Matrix, in 1977. In the early 1990s, as CDs replaced LPs as the dominant format for recorded music, Erlewine purchased what he thought was a CD of early recordings by Little Richard. After buying it, he discovered it was a "flaccid latter-day rehash". Frustrated with the labeling, he researched using metadata to create a music guide. In 1990, in Big Rapids, Michigan, he founded ''All Music Guid ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Mohair
Mohair (pronounced ) is a fabric or yarn made from the hair of the Angora goat. (This should not be confused with Angora wool, which is made from the fur of the Angora rabbit.) Both durable and resilient, mohair is notable for its high luster and sheen, and is often used in fiber blends to add these qualities to a textile. Mohair takes dye exceptionally well. It feels warm in winter as it has excellent insulating properties, while its moisture-wicking properties allow it to remain cool in summer. It is durable, naturally elastic, flame-resistant and crease-resistant. It is considered a luxury fiber, like cashmere, angora, and silk, and can be more expensive than most sheep's wool. Mohair is composed mostly of keratin, a protein found in the hair, wool, horns and skin of all mammals, but mohair's special properties are unique to the Angora goat. While it has scales like wool, the scales are not fully developed, merely indicated. Thus, mohair does not feel the same way comm ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |