Sell Out Records - A Music Review Blog

In 1998 The Dingees released what would become one of my favorite ska-punk records of the decade. You see, I was only listening to what was termed “Christian” music at the time. I didn’t branch out into the many secular bands until about a year later, when I got my hands on an Epitaph Records catalog and bought one of every cassette, vinyl, and CD I could get my grubby hands on. The Dingees put out “Armageddon Massive” and I was immediately amazed at the mix of anti-establishment punk rock, and jazz fused with reggae. At the time, The Supertones were experiencing a huge push, and The Dingees as a result got tagged into the same framework. With this release, the band flowed through 11 songs of punk-ska in the same lines as Less Than Jake, Reel Big Fish, and Operation Ivy. You hear these influences from the starting line of “Ghetto Box Smash”, “Chaos Control”, “Bulletproof”, “Rebel Youth”, and more. This very well could be the best debut record for a ska-punk act ever. That’s pretty bol...

One of the most famous songs from Sublime is actually not an original. It’s a song that they covered, and many others have covered from The Melodians. I once heard a rendition of this song played at a pastor’s conference in Prescott, Arizona. This rocksteady group comes from Jamaica (of course), and is one of the better sounding artists from the 1960s. The song of course is “Rivers of Babylon”. With “Super Best” , the record that came out in 2012, you get a collection of tracks from the group. The disc is 25 tracks of rocksteady, and reggae, but with a subtle religious touch to it. Whether that’s by design or it’s just the signature style of The Melodians, I don’t really know. However, throughout the 25 tracks, you get a true sense for the reggae and ska artist’s passion for the music. There are elements of love, peace, harmony, and even religious ideas sewn throughout the songs. This is the type of ska record that you are going to be able to share with family, friends, and not get lau...