Ska music was my first little tip-toe into the vast world of punk rock. The name is directly onomatopoeic to the style, sounding like the drag of a drum stick on a cymbal before they clamp shut. Ssssska. You can hear the blaring trumpets and the walked bass. As an English nerd, I can completely appreciate it.
The Bug Jar is the perfect place to put on a ska show. The relaxed bar with bat-people decorations hanging from the dramatic cobwebs and the local art priced upon the scrawled-upon walls (professing everything from lost loves to political commentary) help to set the mood. But it's the actual venue, a room no larger than the cramped computer lab I type away in, that sets the tone. The DJ stood cramped in a phone-booth sized corner, and the musicians nearly step on each other as they fight for room on the tiny stage. A couch and dining table sit on the ceiling, as if waiting for Spiderman to come home from work and crack open a cold one.
The acoustics in the room are both phenomenal and shitty, wrapping me in the cacophony of horns and drums and guitar. The people dance and mingle amongst themselves, enjoying their private little parties. And then, from where, I'm not sure, two scrawny boys in their skinny jeans and mohawks are on the floor. They cross their arms at the wrists, like the X's marking their hands, and hold onto each other. And they spin. Round and around and around, laughing and smiling and tripping over themselves. How beautiful the world must have been for them at the moment. And then, the skanking begins, a bizarre mix of the Running Man and Tae Kwan Do.
And that's why I love ska, the beautiful love child of punk anger and reggae's one love.
A great insight into a world I know little about. However, having worked security in night clubs for years and years, I can relate to "private little parties" and "acoustics in the room are both phenomenal and shitty."
ReplyDeleteI was in the Bug Jar once...left when the two guys with orange mohawks walked in. I figured I was out of my element and that place was better left to others. :)
Great feathery touch of detail. You told me just enough to give me the full picture in such a perfect way. Well done. Doesnt it seem so interesting when were are in a place of such wrongs? when I say wrong I mean things that just seem backwards. Like why the hell was the place so small? make the freaking stage bigger. Putting a couch and table on the ceiling is just useless. why aren't the acoustics better? I can answer all of this...BECAUSE ITS SO NICE TO BE IN A PLACE OF JUST WHATEVER! sometimes the mess is comfortable. Its so different which is perfect :)
ReplyDeleteI love how you describe this ska scene it really helped me feel like I was in the bar witnessing those mohawked boys spinning round and round. It made me want to check into ska music too. I've never heard the music described before this post.
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