This album by far will be one of the hippest ones I have found while doing this blog. It was originally $5.99. I tried to get Half Price Books to come down a dollar. When that failed, I asked if I could add a dollar to one of the dollar records I was purchasing to bring this down to $5. The register dude thought I was crazy but went along with it. The compromises I make to do this site.
Bad Manners are a ska band hailing from North London. Formed in 1976 and led by frontman, Buster Bloodvessel, the band was closely associated with the 2 Tone scene despite never signing to the label itself. This culminated with their inclusion in the 1981 documentary, Dance Craze with the Specials, the Selector, The Bodysnatchers, The Beat, and Madness. The clip below is from that documentary. Buster’s madcap antics got the band banned from Top of the Pops as well as Italian TV. After disbanding in 1987, they would reform in 1990 and released 1992’s Fat Sound, which is an excellent album. Other albums and tours followed. Today, Buster is the only original member left and still tours under the Bad Manners moniker.
From what I can tell, this album was put together by Mercury records for a US release in 1983. It accumulates key tracks from the band’s first two albums with UK’s Magnet Records. The songs are right in step with what other UK ska bands were doing at the time. As a result, there are a lot of good tracks on this album including “Inner London Violence”, “King Ska Fa”, “Tequila”, “El Pussycat” and the songs given below as samples.
For sample, I went with the somewhat dated “Loraine” and “Lip Up Fatty”. I could have easily went with others but for some reason while typing this, these came out. So there.
Top Rated. Enjoy it while you can because there are not that many hip records $5.00 or under.