u/Ckellybass

I was thinking about how the breakup of English Beat gave us 2 of the biggest pop hits of the 80s, Tenderness by General Public and She Drives Me Crazy by Fine Young Cannibals. And also how Terry Hall of The Specials co wrote Our Lips Are Sealed by The Go-Gos (and released his own version with Fun Boy 3). I realized there are a bunch of other non ska pop mega hits whose writers and performers are legit ska musicians. Some examples:

Victor Axelrod was keyboard player for The Boilers (and producer for The Frightnrs), and played keys on all of Back To Black by Amy Winehouse (among many others as well)

The horn section for Mephiskapheles (Greg Robinson, Osho Endo, and Alexander McCabe) is on the Moby version of The James Bond theme for Tomorrow Never Dies

Rob Hyman from The Hooters co wrote Time After Time with Cyndi Lauper (and plays keys all over the album)

Eric Bazillion from The Hooters wrote One Of Us by Joan Osborne (and is also on that Cyndi Lauper album)

What other examples can you think of? Not ska songs that became hits (not Bosstones/Madness/English Beat), and not bands that were once considered ska that then became huge (No Doubt/Smashmouth), but legitimate pop mega hits that unexpectedly involve ska musicians. Or huge stars that were in ska bands (like actor Oscar Isaac, who lives in my neighborhood, and our kids are the same age, so I really want to meet him and get him to play ska again).

A compressor that will bring up the volume of a soft part but leave the louder parts alone? In context: I track a lot of ska and reggae drums. That involves a lot of sidestick. The sidestick hits are understandably a lot quieter than the full snare hits. I love how the full hits sound uncompressed (or a tiny bit), but the sidestick needs some more volume, and honestly sounds great when a bit squashed. The current answer is while mixing, either automate an 1176 on for the sidestick, off (or less) for snare hits. But is there a more elegant solution? Or even better, a piece of hardware? (I track with a small console, so I am set up for hardware compressors). How did we do it in the old days?

Before we get the influx of “what was that sound just now” posts