Our friends from Indiana, reggae-soul group Green Room Rockers, need your help! As you may know, Super Bowl XLVI will be played in Indianapolis, IN on Sunday, February 5th and Rolling Stone magazine is putting on a contest to help a local band open up the Volkswagen Rock N’ Roll Tailgate Party for headliners Jane’s Addiction and The Roots. As with most online contests, you have a limited time to vote. Voting begins today and ends on Sunday, January 29th. You can vote once per day. To vote for GRR, click on the link below and click the vote button. When it asks you to login, just connect with Facebook.
As a bonus, you can stream the band’s latest recording, a reggae version of Bob Dylan’s “Wagon Wheel.” Also, if the band wins, frontman Mark Cooper promised to talk trash about the Patriots during the entire set!
Friend of MNSKA and bassist for Brooklyn rocksteady band The Forthrights, Sammy Kay has started an Official Tour Blog over at Musical Occupation. The Forthrights will be embarking on the Ska Is Dead: Young Guns Tour with We Are The Union, Stuck Lucky, Brunt Of It, and Green Room Rockers. After that, the band will be heading West with Maddie Ruthless on the Rocksteady Ruined My Life Tour, which will be hitting Minneapolis on Thursday, May 26th at The Terminal Bar, featuring MNSKA bands The Dropsteppers and The Prizefighters. Read through Sammy’s first blog entry and find a free download from Babylon Party Machine (aka Matt Wixson) who is mashing up The Forthrights’ latest EP Camp Birdman with the sounds of Motown.
Last Saturday, we here at MNSKA had big ol’ party at The Red Sea in Minneapolis, MN. 4 incredible bands came rocked a large crowd into a fever on one of the coldest nights of the winter. Here’s a video of Green Room Rockers closing down the night with a steamy cover of Etta James’ song “I’d Rather Go Blind.” Big thanks to the bands for making the long drive, for the fans for representing the scene, and for anyone that helped make the show a success.
Music columnist Ross Raihala posted in the St. Paul Pioneer Press his latest story about all the hot concerts happening this obscenely cold weekend, including a mention of this of Saturday’s Green Room Rockers show:
The small but dedicated Twin Cities ska community will be out in full force Saturday at the Red Sea for an all-ages show. Indiana’s Green Room Rockers headline with support from Ohio’s Pinstripes. Both acts recently teamed up for the split release “Midwest Soundclash.” Local bands the Dropsteppers and Secondhand Ska Kings are also on the bill.
A reminder that doors are at 5pm with music starting at 6pm for the show. We may be a small, dedicated community, but I have good reason to believe that it will grow significantly in 2011.
You can read the entire article in the Pioneer Press HERE
The first big MNSKA show of the year is happening THIS SATURDAY at The Red Sea (316 Cedar Ave S.) in Minneapolis! It marks the triumphant return of Green Room Rockers, the first MN show by The Pinstripes, and will feature 2 outstanding MNSKA bands The Dropsteppers and Secondhand Ska Kings.
Here are the details:
Doors open at 5pm
Secondhand Ska Kings: 6:00 – 6:45
The Dropsteppers: 7:00 – 7:45
The Pinstripes: 8:00 – 8:45
Green Room Rockers: 9:00 – 10:00
Host of the Flyover Ska Show and contributor to MNSKA.com, Courtney Klos, will be the MC for the night. There will also be door prizes! Everybody loves those! Also, if you have until Thursday to win a pair of tickets to the show. Just email mnskanews@gmail.com with ‘GRR and Pinstripes’ in the subject line!
In lieu of the upcoming concert featuring the Green Room Rockers, DJ Reverend Evan took the time to review their self-titled CD for MNSKA. Evan was the DJ of the long-running Rude Radio show, but has since passed the torch to a new DJ. The Green Room Rockers show is happening on Saturday, January 22nd at The Red Sea in Minneapolis and will be featuring The Pinstripes, The Dropsteppers and Secondhand Ska Kings, to which you can win a pair of tickets.
You can never sing out of tune if you don’t have a singer! Which brings me to our guests this week Bob Timm and Jacob WakeUp! from instrumental NYC reggae/roots/soul band The Hard Times. They tell Courtney the story about how the band was formed out of ska and reggae musicians from New York, Connecticut, and Florida. Living up to their name, a down economy has prevented the group from touring outside the five boroughs but thanks to veteran bands like The Slackers and The Toasters, the band is able to take advantage of playing in a rich musical community. Make sure to check out their hot new EP Two Bucks For Bob(which is oddly available for 3 bucks).
If you’re in the Minneapolis area, be sure to check out our first live event at The Red Sea, featuring performances by Green Room Rockers, The Pinstripes, The Dropsteppers and Secondhand Ska Kings. Head to mnska.com for more information.
The fine folks at Copycats Media have a deal for you, the loyal listener. Mention the Flyover Ska Show and they’ll add 100 FREE 11X17 full color posters to your order.
The Flyover Ska Show is now available on Stitcher, the free podcast radio app for all your better smartphones. It even has shows with no talking.
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
You can download this episode HERE or subscribe to the show on iTunes.
More ska and reggae sound coming from Cincinnati’s The Pinstripes! The band has posted another sample of a song off their upcoming album, which was mixed and mastered by Anthony Abbinanti (The Drastics). Here’s a sample of their song “(Might Be Her) Fool”:
Be sure to catch The Pinstripes when they roll through Minneapolis on January 22nd at The Red Sea with Green Room Rockers, The Dropsteppers, and Secondhand Ska Kings. You can RSVP the show by going to the Facebook event and even win a pair of tickets to the show!
Green Room Rockers have posted a video from their massive show in Chicago last month at The Metro. The guys absolutely killed it! This video is of them playing a cover of Sam Cooke‘s “Bring It On Home” with guest vocalists Todd Hembrook (Deal’s Gone Bad) and JC Brooks (The Uptown Sound).
The band will be bringing this massive sound to Minneapolis on Saturday January 22nd at The Red Sea with special guests The Pinstripes, The Dropsteppers, and Secondhand Ska Kings.
Cincinnati’s up-and-coming ska and reggae group The Pinstripes have a new album on the way and boy are they excited to share it with you! The album is called Out Of Many (UPDATE: I’ve been informed it is still untitled) and has been mixed and mastered by Anthony Abbinanti (The Drastics). The Pinstripes have begun posting samples of the tracks off the new record, beginning with the sample of “Alright Baby.”
Be sure to catch The Pinstripes when they roll through Minneapolis on January 22nd at The Red Sea with Green Room Rockers, The Dropsteppers, and Secondhand Ska Kings. You can check out the Facebook event and even win a pair of tickets to the show!
