PipemanRadio Interviews The Skatalites at Punk Rock Bowling XXIV

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Hey, you have done to the
censure. See why crazy? Youll d

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wake up America. It's time for
the Adventures of White Man on W four

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c Y dot com. West pomp
Beats is number one internet radio station.

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Here's your host, the white Man, it says the pipe Man. Here

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on the Adventures pipe Man W four
c Y Radio. And I'm here with

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Ken Stewart and Nae Frenchy from Scott
the Lights. Yes, here at punk

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rock bowling Man. You guys killed
it out there. That set was amazing

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And what a circle scat dancing pit
you guys had. Well, how does

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it look like when you're up top
there watching these people dance to your music?

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Well, the marsh pit goes way
back to well, I guess punk

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rock, but we see it a
lot in SKA. You know, it's

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been going on for forty years or
so. Yeah, and so what brought

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you guys into SKA? Like,
what when did it happen? Where they

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you felt that that was your music. I was asked to audition for reggae

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bands, and I was playing reggae
for about a year and someone said,

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oh, you got to catch this
band that come into town for the first

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time. The Sky you know,
like what the English Beat played, which

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I loved the English Beat, but
when I ultimately listened to what the Scatellites

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music was, I said, wait
a minute, this predates the English Beat

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by about twenty years, you know, just the fact that they played vinyl

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when they played it on the radio, like, hello, that's right,

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nineteen eighty seven and you're playing vinyl
on the radio. Like So when I

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got to the show, I was
amazed, and I was like, how

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can this exist? And I don't
know about it, but you know,

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that was the beginning of what's now
known as the third wave ska movement.

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And there was bands from Boston like
the bim Skal of Bim, and there

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was the Toasters from New York and
Let's Go Bowling, and you know,

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there was this the spawn of a
revival of this stuff, you know,

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going on. And all of a
sudden, I was playing in this reggae

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band, and all of a sudden, the drummer of the Scatellites became our

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drummer. Whoa, And I was
like, what are you doing here?

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Man? Like I just saw the
band. I thought they'd be touring the

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world, you know, and all
of a sudden he's playing in this little

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rag reggae band in Rhode Island.
But that's what did it for me.

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Once I heard the band. Once
I said to my friend at the show,

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I was like, if I could
be in any band, this is

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the band. It's like wow,
combination of jazz and all of a sudden

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it happened by accident. You know, I love that. What great story?

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How about you? All right?
I was I'm from France, what

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part oh? I wasn't born in
Baldeaux. I grew up in that Rica

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listening to reggae music early eighties,
and I moved back to France and then

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I started music reggae music, had
my own band, and then I moved

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to New York and I freelance for
about ten years in New York. As

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soon as I reach I started to
work as a freelance guitar player and I

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played for everybody in reggae music,
from your Right to Tooths and the Metals

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from Sisla, all the can Booth, Alton Ellis, that's the name in

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reggae music, like legends. So
it was a good experience for ten years

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to freelance and one day I get
a call from Leicester Stelling who was the

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original Catllite sax player, and I
got a call to come sub for the

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guitar player for couple gigs in Mexico. And while they kept me, the

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dorma at the time was loudib the
original drama and they asked me if I

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could stand and do some work,
so I thought, all right, And

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it's been wow, how long?
No? Seventeen years? Sixteen? Wow?

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Time flives too, right, I
know? Speaking of time Fline sixty

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year anniversary, what the hey?
I mean like that is amazing milestone and

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you guys just celebrated it recently with
the show. Yes, well, you

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know, I would like to say
big up the original Caatellite for creating this

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music, you know, back in
the days nineteen sixty four in Jamaica,

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you know. And we all just
joined the band along the way with the

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original. But life everybody passed away
right now, so we are like a

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legas see band. But we all
play with the original and we keep the

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It's important to keep the tradition and
we love the work and with the best

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we can and keep the tradition going
on. And isn't it amazing? Like

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I saw it here a punk rock
bowling you guys played and you played like

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one of your original songs from way
back, and the crowd was like going

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nuts. And No Doubt played that
song at Coachella this year, did they

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really? Wow? You used to
open for us No Doubt Coachella. Wow,

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that's pretty cool. It's a theme. It's a movie theme song,

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you know, but we made it
popular. And then the Specials covered it

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and Amy Whitehouse like no, maybe
no because it's not a vocal. I

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don't know, but you know,
the last Punk Bowling I did media coverage

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four, the Specials played and they
played are you ready for this? Ghost

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Town? When did they do that
live? They never do that live?

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They did it here. Like,
that's pretty wild to me because I was

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gonna be I was gonna be bummed
if they didn't play that song, you

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know. And I'm glad you brought
up about the third wave because I think

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a lot of people don't realize all
the waves of sky. And we used

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to have like a ska show on
our station. This dude was a genius.

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Like I didn't know about all the
waves. I just knew I liked

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the music. I didn't know the
evolution of ska to where it is today.

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So I think a lot of people
should know that, because I think

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they just lump everything together and they
don't know, you know, well,

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I mean there was the evolution from
scott to rock steady to reggae, and

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then the Brits caught on and they
started throwing rock and they were also playing

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you know, English white musicians playing
with English Jamaican black musicians. That's where

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they got the name two Tone from
the guy started the guy from the Specials,

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the keyboard player started the label called
two Tone. And then after that

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comes the third wave where it started
catching on in America. And I can

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remember the first sky band that and
I didn't know that the word SKA.

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But I remember this band we had
in Boston called Double O seven and that

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was like late seventies, early eighties. I think I remember that band.

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They were pretty good, man.
I used to go, you know,

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but that was they were playing it
like punk shows and stuff because there was

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no scat see anything close. Well, it's fine that you say that,

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because I remember in the eighties,
like SKA was made almost a synonymous with

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punk, you know, because of
exactly what you're saying, you know,

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so a lot of oh and because
the band's like Rancid and a lot of

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the hardcore scot Core as they call
it. I can't, you know,

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it's not really my cup of tea, so I can barely even name them.

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But there's so much stuff that's,
you know, much much less mellow

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than our music, you know,
but it's just something for everybody, right.

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And one thing I do love about
your music and others like you is

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the mosh pit, because I'm like, I'm a metal head, I'm a

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punk. I love sky, I
love industrial all that, and I get

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into the craziest of pits, but
I have a lot more fun than a

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ska pit like that. It's just
I can't explain the feeling you have.

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It's just pure happiness. And what
were you gonna say? Well, yeah,

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But the evolution of Scar in Jamaica, it was a couple different style

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of ska with different bands already,
but you can hear the first wave through

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the recording quality. You know already
the style of how they played the music,

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and when you go to England it's
played a little bit different. And

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then when you go to the third
wave America or South America, it's different.

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So many you have the punk SKA
the rock Sky you have the scatellite

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which is more sole and all those
English bands and yeah, so but you

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can hear the difference in the song. Oh yeah, when I did that

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the show on my station, he
started off from the beginning, the original

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SKA and he was playing a music. I was like, it sounded like

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something from like the forties with you
know, that kind of record player type

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of thing, and I just I
mean, maybe I'm on school, but

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I think that's cool. You know, that sounds like there's something about that

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analog sound that has that smoothness opposed
to the chop of the digital that's missing

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all that middle part. Right,
So sixty years now, what what's the

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next milestone? Like, are we
going to one hundred? Now? Well,

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we are, you know, in
the we just released two tracks last

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week and there should be a complete
album probably by the end of the year.

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And you know, we just continue
to travel the world and hopefully play

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some new countries that we haven't been
to, and you know, it's we

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try and revisit the Our biggest Latin
our biggest market really is the Latin people.

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If you go on our Facebook,
there's close to three hundred thousand likes

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and about two d of fifty thousand
or more Latino n What do you attribute

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that to? Well, this is
I was going to actually say that about

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the evolution of the music. I
mean, the original ska was very very

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much Latin influence, especially because of
our drummer, because he played all that

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stuff cha cha ringue and rumba,
salsa, every bit of it, you

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know. And you had to because
if you played on the hotels in the

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north coast of Jamaica in the fifties, you had to play everything calypso and

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everything in between, you know.
So and they played like Glenn Miller stock

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arrangements when they played big bands and
all this kind of stuff that would play

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for the tourists, and they had
to play everything, you know. Nice

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I like it. Also Scatlite hopefully
one hundred years and why not because Scatlite

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is an institution. Is like Buena
Vista Social Club. It is like come

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Busy Orchestra. It's like, you
know, representing the music. You know.

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So now it's become like an institution. It has for sure, I

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mean fully, yeah. Catalytes forever, Scatellites forever, for sure. How

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do people connect to you guys?
On socials on the web or what have

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you buy your merch check out your
show dates, get your new music,

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all that good stuff. Well,
we've got the usual scatlites dot com that's

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s k a t A l I
t e s. And we've got Facebook,

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slash scati Lights, Instagram, slash
Scatillits, Twitter, the whole heap,

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all of it. You know,
we're on Pandora and Spotify and everything.

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You know. I mean, Scatelllits
is like an institution. It's the

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godfather of reggae. And the creators
based or the I'll say they didn't necessarily

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create SKA. A lot of the
chief members of the Scatellites did, but

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they perfected it. There you go. And especially the big change with Lloy

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NIBBs the drama. He changed a
bit from the swing to the most straight

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sky. That's what we play more
and that's what we dance, So that's

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what we danced to, right,
Yeah, So that's yeah, I love

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that was that change? You know? Yeah, Well, you guys killed

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it here at Punk Rock Bowling and
I didn't expect that in last but it

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is amazing to have you here.
And thanks for being on the Adventures pipe

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Man. Well thanks thanks you guys
for having us. It was a pleasure

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and we hope we'll be back.
We love you, We love Vegas,

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big up, big up the show. Yeah it is. It is one

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of my favorite playgrounds. Yes,
it's been a big play measure and uh

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you know, we love coming here
to perform for everybody. And it's been

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a pleasure meeting you. And thanks
a lot. Oh my pleasure, and

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I hope we do it again.
Thank you for listening to the Adventures of

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Pipe Man. I'm w for CUI
Radio. Hi, this is Ken Stewart

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from the scot Delights and you're listening
to W four c y Heypeman