Note to self – stop reviewing ska CDs. It’s a genre that I really don’t like too much anymore. Call me old fashioned, but if I go to a gig with a ska band playing and I watch all the ‘kids’ skanking away at the front I cringe with embarrassment. I remember back to days when that was me – so forgive me for wincing when I realise just how silly I must have looked. Anyway, back in 1997/8 I adored the likes of Less Than Jake, Mad Caddies and Reel Big Fish and, by the sounds of it, so did Schoolboy Error. These southern kids are absolutely fantastic at what they do, even if they rip off every pop-ska band ever known to man.
This isn’t my thing, I hold my hands up now and I take a vow to pass on all ska records to Ben from here on in. However, I will always give credit where it’s due and ‘Upstairs For Thinking, Downstairs For Dancing’ is a really fun record, full of catchy melodies and dancey bits. Not that you’d catch me dancing to them now mind you (not without a zimmer frame anyway). Still, there’s 12 tracks on offer here, meaning more than 45 minutes of pure, unadulterated fun. And while Schoolboy Error clearly wear their ska hearts on their sleeves and are not afraid of admitting they’ve blindly ripped off a stack of more famous American bands, you cannot help but admire the amount of fun they’re having.
They won’t win any prizes for the depth of lyrics, nor for originality, but in the ‘smile like you mean it’ (TM The Killers) stakes I think we may have a winner. With the summer coming up those with a liking to stripped down poppy ska with a brilliant brass section will surely have found their new favourite band. If someone who doesn’t like ska can enjoy this record, that must say something, right? Sure, there are some duffers here (the intro’s dull as Hell, for example), but overall Schoolboy Error are on the right lines – and whether you like this genre of music or not, you have to sit up and recognise the fact that these are young kids having fun. And lots of it at that. Well worth checking out.
www.schoolboyerror.tk
Paul