The Yellow Jacket » Audio http://tyjna.com Everything North Augusta High School Thu, 17 May 2012 16:12:02 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.2 Ska-rumptious http://tyjna.com/audio/2011/09/30/ska-rumptious/ http://tyjna.com/audio/2011/09/30/ska-rumptious/#comments Fri, 30 Sep 2011 17:18:01 +0000 RickyB http://tyjna.com/?p=11718 Today, if you were to try to strike a conversation on ska at your lunch table, you’d be likely to be met with blank stares.  It’s also likely you’d have to explain its meaning.  Ska is a musical genre.  It’s similar to other genres except it often adds the sounds of horns.  Its origin can be traced to Jamaica in the late 1950’s.  It had sounds similar to American Jazz combined with a sound that later would evolve into reggae.  This period of ska became known as the First Wave.  In the 1970’s, ska moved into its Second Wave where its influence spread beginning in the UK and on to other parts of Europe.  The sounds of the Second Wave had faster tempos and fuller instrumentation.  Bands like Madness and The Beat launched ska music into a new level of popularity, which would later set the platform for the Third Wave of the 1980s.  It wasn’t until this third wave movement that ska bands began to appear in the United States during the 1990s.

Third wave ska kept similar sounds to second wave ska with the addition of styles of punk rock.  Typical third wave ska bands have the same instruments as a regular rock band, but also are likely to have a trumpet, trombone, saxophone, and sometimes a piano.  While most bands have 3 to 5 members, ska bands can have from 7 to 15 members.

Towards the end of the 90’s ska music began to decline in popularity within the United States.  Many ska bands broke up or completely converted their styles to punk rock.  However,some more dedicated ska bands and ska fans still remain.  It’s no longer highly popular, but many bands still maintain a healthy amount of faithful fans.

At North Augusta High School, ska fans can be considered to be somewhat of an “endangered species”, though it is likely that a few of the people you know are familiar with ska’s sound.  Students who are fans of ska often compliment the unique mood within the music.  Jordan Gamble humorously pointed out, “Ska is pretty good at making any lyrics sound happy; even if the words are completely depressing.” Eric Club added,“Ska always makes me feel like I’m on a beach.” Whether Eric’s opinion is true for all ska fans is debatable, but Eric’s love for ska music is obvious. Following his statement Eric said, “No but seriously, ska is very underrated despite the amazing talent involved. Today, it’s somewhat underground in America, and isn’t given near as much air time on the radio as it deserves.”

In the past, Hampton Williams was unfamiliar with ska.  Upon experiencing ska music for the first time Hampton’s opinion was positive. “To me ska is a mix of a lot of different genres, but the different styles of music are well incorporated and don’t give me the feeling of a bunch of sounds just thrown together.”  Many people would agree with that opinion.  Because of the diversity in sounds involved, many people also find that it’s hard to find two ska bands that sound alike.

If you’re interested in discovering new sounds of music, you can try out some of the bands below:

  • Reel Big Fish
  • Streetlight Manifesto (Also see Catch 22; and Bandits of Acoustic Revolution)
  • The Toasters
  • Less Than Jake
  • Five Iron Frenzy
  • The Aquabats
  • Mad Caddies
  • The Selectors
  • The Specials
  • The Slackers
  • The Mighty Mighty Bosstones
  • Rustic Root
  • The Skalites
  • Westbound Train
  • Madness
  • The Beat (The English Beat)

 

 

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