It’s fitting that the Specials chose Los Angeles as the location for their first reunion shows in the United States in nearly three decades. Southern California has long proven to be the American ska scene’s ground zero, spawning the likes of Sublime, No Doubt, Operation Ivy and Rancid, among others — all of whom were both clearly influenced by the U.K. “2 Tone” legends; Specials lead singer Terry Hall even co-wrote the hit “Our Lips Are Sealed” by archetypal L.A. band the Go-Gos.

So when the band hit the stage for a sold-out show at downtown Los Angeles’ Club Nokia last night, it felt like a homecoming. While missing founding member Jerry Dammers, the band otherwise featured all original members, save Dammers’ keyboardist replacement and a crack three-piece horn section. And despite the gap in years since the Specials’ last U.S. tour, when the band kicked into “Do the Dog” as its opening number, it was clear nothing had been lost in the interim. From the first note, everyone in the nearly 10-piece band played with a manic intensity that wouldn’t suggest its members were in their fifties. For the majority of the sprawling, 22 song set — drawn from the band’s classic first two albums and assorted singles — most numbers careened full stop into the next with startling, infectious velocity. If only all reunion tours felt so vital and fresh. Right off the bat, it was clear this was the real deal and not a money grab.

“Do the Dog” was an appropriate starter, its opening lines — “All you punks and all you teds/National Front and natty dreads/Mods, rockers, hippies and skinheads/Keep on fighting ’til you’re dead” — sounded like a call to arms for the multiracial tribes assembled, and a prescient reflection on the audience’s behavior. By the fourth song, “Up To You,” the crowd had grown unruly in their excitement — a little too authentic to the spirit of the original punks. “If you spit anymore, I’ll dive down and break your head,” Hall exclaimed with brimming vitriol at the start of the fourth song, “Up To You”; the rough atmosphere continued, however, with fights breaking out sporadically and the stage repeatedly invaded by audience members. Then again, the hectic vibes radiating through the venue proved this was no mere nostalgia trip: it only reflected the continued significance of the music’s relentless riddims and inner-city tension.

Any drama, however, didn’t detract from the incredible chemistry and musical interplay between its nattily attired members: ska is a music built on precision and control, and here the Specials triumphed, moving from stop-on-a-dime uptempo grooves to deeper, dubby textures effortlessly. Drummer John Bradbury thrilled with machine-gun rimshots and hyperactive hi-hat; guitarists Roddy Byers and Lynval Golding added strikingly soulful solos to songs like “Blank Expression”; and bassist Horace Panter’s crisply sinister basslines never faltered. The two frontmen, however, proved a study in crucial contrasts, meanwhile. Toaster Neville Staple was all gleeful dance power, skanking constantly and hyping the crowd with glee; Terry Hall, meanwhile, evoked a bluebeat Johnny Rotten, roiling with nervous energy and sarcasm, gripping the mike stand aggressively and even pulling back from the spotlight at times. Dammer’s absence proved most notable in songs from the band’s second album, 1980’s More Specials: on record, tracks like “Stereotype/Stereotypes, Pt. 2” featured an ironic muzak influence and studio trickery, all of which was dispensed here in lieu of sweaty immediacy.

Seeing the Specials live drove home the artfulness of the band’s songwriting, which could be potentially lost in the performance’s driving power: hearing a crowd sing in unison the choruses to classics like “A Message To You, Rudy” conveyed just how indelible their hooks remain. Instead of seeming dated, the songs’ themes came off timeless — if anything, more relevant today than when they were released in the ‘80s. The nuclear-war paranoia of “Man At C & A” and the economic-doldrums dub dirge “Ghost Town” (which made for a truly affecting encore) to the growing pains of shifting racial attitudes (nearly every song) could be ripped from today’s headlines. “Sorry it took a lifetime to get us back here,” Golding said midway through the set, and the apology felt apt: another 30 years is truly too long to wait for music so trenchant and powerful, no matter when it’s played.

Set list:

“Do The Dog”
“(Dawning Of A) New Era”
“Gangsters”
“It’s Up To You”
“Monkey Man”
“Rat Race”
“Hey, Little Rich Girl”
“Blank Expression”
“Doesn’t Make It Alright”
“Stupid Marriage”
“Concrete Jungle”
“Friday Night, Saturday Morning”
“Stereotype/Stereotypes, Pt. 2″
“Man at C & A”
“A Message To You, Rudy”
“Do Nothing”
“Little Bitch”
“Nite Klub”
“Too Much Too Young”
“You’re Wondering Now”

Encore:
“Ghost Town”
“Enjoy Yourself (It’s Later Than You Think)”

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On Monday, April 19th, you will be looking at at the new Rollingstone.com — a cleaner, easier-to-navigate site that’ll boost our regular doses of daily rock news, photo galleries and music reviews with new audio and video features. We’ll also be debuting three new blogs: Rob Sheffield on pop culture, David Fricke on music and Matt Taibbi on politics.

We’ll also be introducing “Rolling Stone All Access,” which will give those who sign up full contents of each new issue as it hits newsstands and the key to the entire Rolling Stone archives. You’ll be able to lose yourself in every issue since we started back in San Francisco in November 1967. Every review we ever published, every cover and the deepest, most thoughtful interviews with rock legends, from John Lennon to Lil Wayne, Bob Dylan to Kurt Cobain — and 43 years of journalism that has defined our times, from Hunter S. Thompson to P.J. O’Rourke to Matt Taibbi.

So stay tuned: you’re just days away from the future of Rollingstone.com.

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• Perry Farrell thought he’d scored Soundgarden’s first-ever reunion gig for Lollapalooza, but the grunge vets will actually take the stage tonight at Seattle’s Showbox for a secret show, Billboard reports.

• Rihanna’s “Rude Boy” continued its strong run on the Hot 100, taking Number One for the fifth straight week, according to Billboard. B.o.B.’s “Nothin’ On You” scored second place.
• Tool have begun work on their fifth album, TwentyFourBit reports via the band’s newsletter to fans, which promises they’re working up “intros, progressions, agitatos, con sordinos, crescendos, diatonics, inversions, resolutions, transitions, variations, obbligatos, consonance, and endings.”
• T.I. has confirmed his new album, titled King Uncaged, will hit stores August 24th. For much more on the Atlanta rapper’s return, grab our new issue, on sale now.

View full post on Rolling Stone : Rock and Roll Daily

Photo: Rogash/Getty(Ortiz), Trotman/Getty(Jay-Z)

The heated Yankees-Red Sox rivalry has branched into the rap game. Jay-Z, a diehard Yankees fan who even wore the team’s cap on the cover of Kingdom Come, is suing Boston Red Sox designated hitter David Ortiz for allegedly using the name of Jigga’s 40/40 Club chain for his own nightclub in the Dominican Republic without permission. In a lawsuit filed yesterday, Jay accuses Big Papi of naming his Santa Domingo nightclub “Forty-Forty,” a variation of Jay-Z and Juan Perez’s line of 40/40 Clubs in New York, Las Vegas and Atlantic City.

“[Jay-Z and Perez] have accused Ortiz of trading on the fame, value and goodwill of their name through his club Forty/Forty and its website, www.fortyforty.net, which they say has caused their business ‘marketplace confusion and damage,” reads the lawsuit. Jay-Z’s suit goes on to argue that the shared name isn’t accidental, as Ortiz “has been a patron [at the 40/40 Club] on several occasions long before he opened his infringing Forty/Forty Club.”

As Jay-Z’s “Empire State of Mind” all but soundtracked the Yankees’ World Series-winning run last season, it’s no surprise that he might take offense to someone not named Derek Jeter or Alex Rodriguez opening a club with the “40/40″ name. The baseball blog Big League Stew points out the “40/40″ moniker comes from when a player achieves both 40 home runs and 40 steals in one season. Only four players in history have done it — including current Yank A-Rod — but Big Papi hasn’t come close, managing only 10 steals total over the course of his entire 14-year baseball career. (To Ortiz’s credit, he has hit a Red Sox record 54 home runs in a season, but then why not the “Fifty-Ten Club”?)

No word whether Jay-Z is seeking compensation, a club name change or maybe just an apology from Ortiz for his Game Four, 12th inning, course-of-history-changing walk-off home run against the Yankees in the 2004 playoffs.

On a Jigga side note, the Blueprint 3 rapper will headline tonight’s festivities at the Coachella Festival in Indio, California. Tune into the brand new Rollingstone.com this weekend for our full report.

Related Stories:

• Coachella Reveals Set Times, Fans Consider Conflicts: Jay-Z or PiL?
• Jay-Z, Muse, Gorillaz, Pavement Booked for 2010 Coachella Fest
• Jay-Z, Alicia Keys Tour New York in “Empire State of Mind” Video

View full post on Rolling Stone : Rock and Roll Daily