#36 Hepcat - Out of Nowhere
I have a love hate relationship with ska.
When done well it's soul filling goodness, but when its done poorly it's the most campy bull**** ever. The whole third wave of American ska was the worst thing to ever happen to the genre. During the mid 90's it seemed like
I was swimming in a sea of Reel Big Fish-esque ska bands that came across as a bunch of former high school band geek frat boys that decided to start a band to help them get more pussy.
It was during this time that I was beginning to consider that cutting music education funding to public schools might actually be a good thing. There were just too many horny post pubescent boys running around with slide trombones for me to feel comfortable anymore.
I had all but given up on the genre figuring that nobody cared about true ska, Jamaican ska, anymore and I predicted that the rest of my life would be a long drawn out pathetic scene of me curled up in my bed clutching my Desmond Dekker & Don Drummond records as tightly as i could while trying to keep the Hawaii Five O theme song from playing over and over again in my brain. It was just then that I saw a bright and beautiful light shining from the west and it was coming from, of all places, Los Angeles, California.
First off Hepcat, as I'm sure some genre nazi would inevitably chime in, are
technically not ska they're rock steady, and for those of you that don't know the difference I'll gladly explain it to you just as soon as i start giving a **** about the minutiae that separate the two genres.
Hepcat as a band have done more to revitalize the roots of jamaican ska/rock steady than any band I know. The prevalent style of this album is quite jazzy with a bit of doo-wop flair that is largely due to the glorious harmonies created by the two vocalists Greg Lee and Alex Desert. Out of Nowhere has a very contagious up-beat and positive vibe with songs like
Dance Wid' Me and
Earthquake and Fire find me resisting the urge to start dancing right where I stand. There is a bold and vivacious cover of early Bob Marley and the Wailers'
Hooligans as well as an amazing ska interpretation of Duke Ellington's jazz classic
Caravan.
This is really one of my favorite albums. I couldn't be more emphatic about recommending a piece of music, and if anyone's interested PM me and I will gleefully bust one out for you.