The "B" Band!

Band: Big D & The Kids Table

Country: USA

Notable Album: How It Goes

Favourite Song: "The Sounds of Allston Village"

SO! Big D takes the "B" spot for my ska list! These Allston, MA ska-punksters have been recording album after album since 1995, with no signs of slowing down - well, that's not completely true. Everything after How It Goes has been steadily slowing down as they try to mature and find a more permanent spot in the realm of third-wave ska. I have to honestly say, however, it was a real disappointment to hear their newest album, Fluent in Stroll, after secretly dancing to songs like "Noise Complaint" and "Fly Away" from their 2007 album Strictly Rude. So I dance to ska when there's no one else around. Get over it. It's awesome. Try it.

Pretty sweet, right?  This was at Warped tour 2009

It's hard to choose between How It Goes and Strictly Rude, but How It Goes takes the cake for several reasons. Firstly, Dave McWane's voice has NEVER changed - ever. But it's hard to listen to a band mature while the singing style stays the same - and that's a big problem that I have with Fluent in Stroll. How can a band change their sound or style when not everything changes? Especially with someone with such a recognizable voice as Dave, the new style just doesn't fit. Anyways, I chose How It Goes over Strictly Rude because Dave's voice fits much more with their frantic ska-punk albums than their smoother, more melodic ones - and How It Goes is just as much ridiculous punk rock as it is ska-punk. This album is also a lot closer to the style they started out with, and that's another reason why I chose it. I believe that bands create music in a genre because that's the kind of music that they love to play, and it also gives the band itself an identifiable style or genre. But if a band all of a sudden decides to play something totally different, then it destroys what they've created as that band. I'm totally up for members of bands creating different music, but put it under a different name! But I digress. Although some tracks stand out more than others for me, I can easily listen to this album all the way through over and over, and I have been doing so all day!

"The Sounds of Allston Village" is an obvious throwback to Big D's stomping ground - Allston, MA. It's a semi-instrumental track, with backup girls singing some ooh's and ahh's and Dave's voice cutting in every once in a while to add some extra flair. It's a smooth and relatively short song, but probably the best out of all the tracks to open the album (did I mention it's the opening track?). Other tracks that I absolutely love from this album are "You Lose, You're Crazy," "My Girlfriend's On Drugs," and the greatest Specials cover ever (yes, Nobodies Home can't even do it better than these guys!) of "Little Bitch." But "Allston" is my absolute favourite because it's so simple - you'll know it each time you hear it, and it'll get stuck in your head so fast and so sneakily that you won't even notice that you've been humming it for the last three hours. 3 chords (perfect!), funky bass (snazzy!), fun little keyboard intro at the beginning (oh yeah!), very traditional ska drumming (bonus!), and one of the sweetest horn lines ever (cha-ching!) make this an absolute perfect song for anyone!

If you want to relax, listen to this song. If you want to pump yourself up but calm your mind first, listen to this song then the rest of the album. If you want an easy song for your band to cover, listen to this song.

If you want to support the band by buying any of their albums, go here.

Stay tuned for tomorrow's installment, the "C" word (GET IT?)!