Formed in 1981 in Berkeley, while they were still in high school. The Uptones were the first band devoted to playing Ska on the West Coast. The Uptones played to skanking crowds all over the West. Several of their recordings were regional hits, and for a time they were the most popular band in the Bay Area. Major publications of the time raved about them: “It is a sight to behold, The Uptones tearing up the stage and the audience tearing up the dance floor.” - San Francisco Chronicle “The Uptones… without a doubt the best show in Berkeley.” - Berkeley Free Press “Sitting down at an uptones show is like keeping your eyes shut at a movie.” - Rolling Stone The Uptones “Live at Gilman Street” (SOB CD 0058) is a living proof of the raw power the band delivered every show. “Best live Ska record ever” - Crawdaddy Magazine “***** Five Stars “This record rocks from beginning to end.” - Rolling Stone “The Uptones, the Bay Area’s best ska band of all time.” – Pacific Sun Several tracks from this legendary recording are offered for free in the mp3 format at www.uptones.com Members of the original band, Eric Din, Paul Jackson, and Bennie Wood have been playing music together since then. First as Hobo and then as Stiff Richards The ska bug never left these lads. And now Eric, Paul, and Bennie are joined by Moose Lethridge, Adam Beach, Tim Carter, Jeanne Geiger, and Scott Bertrand to form the current lineup of The Uptones. The Uptones have completed their first CD “Skankin’ Foolz Unite” for Fun Fun Fun Recordings containing new original material with producers Matthew King Kaufman and Michael Rosen. ~!~!~!~!~!~!~!~!~!~!~!~!~!~ UPTONES GET DOWN –by Joel Selvin, San Francisco Chronicle March 23, 2008 The Uptones broke up more than 20 years ago, although Eric Dinwiddie, Paul Jackson and Ben Eastwood never stopped playing music together. The pioneer Berkeley ska band that started when its members were in high school had been an instant success. But it ended its run four years later. “It just sort of dissipated,” says Dinwiddie, who goes by Din, sitting in his Oakland bachelor pad. “It didn’t make any sense to continue. But it was always unfinished business to me.” The Uptones left it to East Bay ska disciples such as Rancid, whose members used to regularly attend Uptones performances, to take the ska beat into the punk world. Other former Uptones players drifted into the fertile jazz scene in Berkeley and made names for themselves there. But the Uptones never really died; they just went away for a while. Dinwiddie, Jackson and Eastwood continued, first as Hobo, a pop-rock outfit, and later as Stiff Richards, a more hard-rocking band, and they never stopped playing club gigs. But the inner Uptones kept struggling to get out. When original Uptones guitarist Charles Stella came back to town after years in New York, the ska infection resurfaced and, shortly thereafter, the Uptones were back on the boards, two decades later, with a new horn section and a brilliant new album that resounds with the strength of the lifelong creative collaboration at its center. Dinwiddie, 42, lives in a one-room cottage tucked behind a house on a quiet street near the bustling Rockridge shopping district. While relatively tidy, the quarters, which Dinwiddie shares with his cat, Buster, are crammed with musical gear and computer equipment. Guitarist Musashi Lethridge, 40, a longtime friend and fan who took Stella’s place in the permanent reunion and is known as Moose - steps outside the open French doors to smoke a cigarette, but the patio is almost like part of the room. Dinwiddie’s little warren is the unofficial headquarters of the band’s creative core, where the songs are written and the band’s music begins. Jackson, 40, eats a burrito at the card table holding Dinwiddie’s recording setup with the ease of someone who has spent many hours in the room. “It haunted me for a long time that we didn’t live up to our potential,” Dinwiddie says. “That’s what we’re doing now. It’s all about the dancing. There’s so much fun to be had dancing to ska.” Ska began in Jamaica in the late ’50s, long before the advent of reggae, the music’s more modern cousin. Unlike reggae, often known for social and political content, ska is dance music, plain and simple. When the music spread to England in the mid-’60s, it was adopted by Mod youth of the day and reprised in the ’80s New Wave era by 2-Tone record label bands such as Madness, the English Beat and the Specials. The English, as they always do, translated the musical style into a fashion, complete with requisite dance steps, haircuts and wardrobes. It was after attending a concert by the English Beat at the San Francisco Civic Auditorium, in November 1981, that these three Berkeley High School students vowed to form a ska band. Within six months, their nine-piece band was packing clubs such as Berkeley’s La Peña and opening concerts for hot out-of-town acts, including the Go Go’s and Billy Idol. Local radio stations were playing the band’s demo tape, “Out to Sea,” all while keyboardist Jackson was still too young to get a driver’s license. “There weren’t any other ska bands at the time,” Jackson says. “There were bands trying to sound like the Police, let’s put it that way, but there weren’t any ska bands. A lot of people came and went.” Jackson ticks off the names of the hot young jazzmen who swiftly passed through the Uptones’ ranks: Dave Ellis, Kenny Brooks, Jay Lane, Joshua Redman. “It was like a school,” he says. The Uptones may have folded when Ronald Reagan was still president, but ska never went away. Absorbed into the punk-rock culture, the Jamaican rhythms took on new life in the hands of young musicians such as the Uptones disciples in Rancid and Long Beach’s million-selling punk-ska band Sublime. No Doubt, the multiplatinum Orange County band that produced Gwen Stefani, started life as a ska band (although “it didn’t sound like ska to me,” says Jackson, who co-wrote songs and played keyboards on the first three Rancid albums). Meanwhile, the three original Uptones experienced life as an alternative indie rock band, with all the attendant indignities, such as a Clear Lake gig where the audience was so small and quiet the band could hear the crickets chirping outside between numbers. But they always kept a practice hall, and they kept making music together. “There was always a gig,” Dinwiddie says. “We never went more than two months without a gig. They weren’t like Uptones gigs. They were like …” “… any gig,” Jackson says. As the pop-flavored Hobo gave way to the more raucous Stiff Richards, more of the old Uptones material started slipping back in. “By the time we started the Uptones again, Stiff Richards was a ska band waiting for a ska rhythm section and horns,” Dinwiddie says. Never forgot the band Dinwiddie never gave up the spirit of the Uptones, even when he and his comrades were playing under the other band names. “I was never that comfortable with those names,” he says. “I had a lot of fun and all that, but the Uptones - that’s my band. These other bands, they were just keeping the heart of the Uptones alive.” The musicians have worked with producer Matthew King Kaufman since before the 1992 Hobo record. Kaufman was the founder and “reigning loony” of Beserkley Records, the maverick East Bay independent label of the ’70s and ’80s where he produced records by the Greg Kihn Band, Jonathan Richman and the Rubinoos. At the final stage of both the band and the label, Kaufman released a lone Uptones single. “They’re easily the most musically talented bunch I’ve worked with,” says Kaufman, who has spent four years putting together the new Uptones album, “Skankin’ Foolz Unite,” and releasing it on his own Fun Fun Fun Recordings label. “The power of them playing together all those years is what I find stupefying. And with Eric, Paul and Ben playing the key positions, it’s easy for them to drive everything.” The musicians show up for a recent dress rehearsal at Soundwaves Studio in industrial West Oakland with their ska wardrobe - Jackson a ball of light in a silver-sequined suit - ready to have their photograph taken. Hat boxes and street shoes litter the floor as the band, in full costume, runs over a new original, “Keep Pushing.” The rhythm players are crisply efficient, the three-piece brass section tight as a lug nut. Not shy people Even before the photographer arrives, Dinwiddie, dressed head to toe in black-and-white checks, and Lethridge dance around madly, bumping into each other. These are not shy people. The band members stay in constant motion, long-legged trombonist Jeanne Geiger silently mouthing the lyrics when she’s not playing. Eastwood, Dinwiddie and Jackson stay on one side of the stage around Jackson’s keyboard stack, the engine room of the band, and, after the horns offer a lazy, sonorous introduction, they stoke the fire like madmen. Dinwiddie careens around the stage, flashing his checkerboard shoes. “That’s why I liked the Uptones,” he had said earlier. “It’s because you can dance to it. I like pretty songs as much as anybody, but I don’t want to play them.” – San Francisco Chronicle ~!~!~!~!~!~!~!~!~!~!~!~!~!~ BEST SKA BAND - The Uptones American ska is far less celebrated than its Jamaican and English counterparts. Yet the up-tempo, dance-friendly genre has had considerable impact on pop culture, having influenced everyone from Sublime to No Doubt to Green Day. One of the first (and greatest) American ska outfits, however, was raised right here in the East Bay — the Uptones. Products of Berkeley High School and Cazadero music camp, the Uptones became a force to be reckoned with on the local live music scene in the early ’80s, skanking onto radio airwaves with their powerful anti-war jingle, “Out to Sea.” which led to a deal with now-defunct I.R.S. records (one of the tastemaking indie labels of that era). Despite massive amounts of critical acclaim — Crawdaddy called their Live at Gilman Street album the “best live ska record ever” while Rolling Stone exclaimed “this record rocks from beginning to end” — their I.R.S. debut K.U.S.A. failed to capture their live show. The band broke up more than two decades ago, although members continued on in Stiff Richards and Hobo. But the ska jones never left their bones. Earlier this year, the newly reunited Uptones released Skankin’ Foolz Unite on Fun Fun Fun Records and have been playing shows ever since, as if to make up for lost time. The Uptones’ philosophy is probably best summed up by the lyrics of “Skanking Fool,” which state: So don’t be surprised if you feel the beat/Don’t be ashamed if you move your feet/In an East Bay style that’s doctor approved/Nobody bounce back like a skanking fool. ~!~!~!~!~!~!~!~!~!~!~!~!~!~ More recent press quotes and reviews: The Uptones, Minks, Tried & True Every generation has its own ska revival, and for people who went to Bay Area high schools in the ’80s, one of the biggest names in the scene was the UpTones. The band formed while its members were still students at Berkeley High School and quickly became one of the most popular concert attractions around the bay. Three original members of the band have revived the UpTones and are inspiring a new crop of kids to dance. This is an all-ages show. –San Francisco Chronicle Last night I went to a ska concert with Fishbone, The Uptones, The Chop Tops and The Gallows… The Uptones - were badass. This was ska-punk the way it should be played: with eight band-members, three horn-players (the trombonist was female!), and some fucking catchy tunes. I will definitely try to get ahold of more of their music. –sataf’s last fm journal (excerpt) “It’s a great time of year to get out to Rancho Nicasio and see some of the world-class music they continually bring to Marin. On May 16 check out the long-awaited return of The Uptones, the Bay Area’s best ska band of all time.” –Pacific Sun