The World According To Carl

Ska is a music genre that originated in Jamaica in the late 1950s, and was the precursor to rocksteady and reggae. Ska combined elements of Caribbean mento and calypso with American jazz and rhythm and blues. It is characterized by a walking bass line accented with rhythms on the offbeat.

In the early 1960s, ska was the dominant music genre of Jamaica and was popular with British mods. Later it became popular with many skinheads. Music historians typically divide the history of ska into three periods: the original Jamaican scene of the 1960s, the English 2 Tone ska revival of the late 1970s and the third wave ska movement, which started in the 1980s.

You can watch a brief history of ska here. Now that you know what ska is according to definition, let me tell you briefly how I became a fan of the genre.

I was born in the 1960’s and reared in Mississippi all the way until I graduated from college. In those formative years, the music played on the radio was rock, country, blues and r&b. At least the stations of which I frequently listened. That was pretty much the extent of my music horizons on the radio. And with the additions of listening to my Grandparents’ big band and swing albums and 78s the only other expansion of my musical horizons were the trips we took to New Orleans. However that is a story for another time and blog entry.

When I started college in 1981, I was already a professional radio disc jockey with several years of experience under my belt so I was drawn to the student run campus radio station. It was a sad little station atop Lee Hall on the campus of Mississippi State University. Its call letters at the time were WMSB (it no longer exists — the station went dark immediately after I graduated in 1986 but a completely new and majorly improved station was built elsewhere on campus in the years after I left MSU) and it was run by the students with a couple of faculty advisors. This is where I first was introduced to not only the genre which became known as alternative but also several other genres including ska. In fact, the first two groups that really grabbed my attention were Madness (which remain my favorite group of all time) and Bad Manners. However I soon discovered other ska artists such as The Specials, The Selecter, The Skatalites and several others. Thus began my lifelong passion of ska.

Needless to say, ska is a genre that has a small yet devoted following in the United States. I count myself as one. So it’s a nice surprise to find a blog devoted to ska such as Ska Blah Blah which I found via a post over at BoingBoing. I’ve amassed a collection of over 200 ska CDs at the moment and I keep my eye out for other ska CDs to add to my collection. Ska Blah Blah will be a very welcome resource to expand my collection and also a nice place to visit and leave comments with other folks who like ska as well. I have added it to the bloglist on the sidebar at the left of your screen. If you’ve not sampled ska before, I urge you to give it a try. It’s great uptempo music and really fun.

Trackposted to Nuke’s, Blog @ MoreWhat.com, Rosemary’s Thoughts, Political Byline, Woman Honor Thyself, Adam’s Blog, DragonLady’s World, The Pink Flamingo, Leaning Straight Up, Democrat=Socialist, and Right Voices. Also, thanks to Linkfest Haven Deluxe.