Ska’d For Life - A Brief Biography................................................................................
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Formed by the lead vocalist Lee in 1993 the band started life as an 8 piece with three members on brass. They Played their first gig on September 19th of that year in a little village pub in St.Day, Cornwall. Rather than becoming a run of the mill pub band like countless others, they found themselves with a huge following almost immediately. The first six months of the band’s life was spent playing on the local circuit of the south west region, some of the highlights being two gigs with The Selecter in Plymouth and Desmond Dekker at Truro City Hall. The band recorded an album of covers, plus two of their own songs. Self titled ’Ska’d For Life’, the recording quickly sold out. It was released on tape only, but the band have plans to re-release it on cd in the near future. Now steadily playing to packed houses almost four or five times a week, the band, at the end of it’s first six months changed. Out went the brass section and in came Beki on sax (still with the band today). Out went one of the guitarists, and a keyboard player was brought in. More gigs supporting the likes of The Toasters, Bad Manners, The Selecter, Desmond Dekker and plenty of their own gigs followed. Another tape was released, it was a live gig recording called Ska’d For Life Live. On the back of this the band went on to start touring Europe in their second year. Basing themselves in Antwerp, Belgium, the band have so far been on 32 European tours. Starting in small venues the band quickly built up a good fan base creating the need for bigger venues. The band continued to play to sell out crowds in Belgium, Germany, Holland, Czech Republic and Poland. Band members came and went but Lee and Becki were present throughout. During their time on the continent the band played to crowds of upto 7000 people. The band were signed to a Belgian Label called Shut Up and Eat records. They went on to record two singles and an album on this label. The singles were ’Streetlife/Pick It Up’, a double A side, ’Do the Ska’ and an album entitled ’Sober’. The single Do The Ska made it in to the top Fifteen of the Belgium airplay chart. While this was going on the band were also playing all over the U.K. playing as far south as the Scilly Isles and as far North as the Shetland Islands.
The band had played almost 1400 gigs when the band went through another dramatic change losing the keyboard player and shortly afterwards departure of the bass player, the drummer and the guitarist, leaving Lee and Beki a mountain to climb. Within a year though the band was back on the road with the current lineup, getting stronger and stronger as each gig passed. The last line up was Lee - Vocals, Beki - Sax, Richard - Bass, Tony - Guitar, Kirsty - Keyboards and Tony on drums.
Other highlights of the band have been playing live national radio shows in Belgium, live spots on National Belgium Talk Shows and numerous support acts (recently in 2007, playing with The Beat, Bad Manners and The Specials) and headline slots of their own.
KEEP SKANKING.
Recording Ska’d For Life
New CD out in Europe in may on Brixton Records www.brixtonrecords.com (Japanese release coming soon on Disk Union) New 45 out in Euro in may on Golden Singles www.myspace.com/thegoldensingles New mp3s up on myspace right now!
Rocksteady 7 on tour! May 26 – Madrid – Gruta 77 (10/12) May 27 – Valencia – Black Note (10/12) May 28 – Barcelona – Sala Rock Sound (10/12) May 29 – Xixon (Gijon) – Savoy (10/12) May 30 – Bilbao – Txakoli Montagane (gratis/free)
By the way, Im also doing a tour with my other band, the slackers, from may 1 -24 in Europe. Check that out at www.myspace.com/theslackers Thanks for the support! Dave
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