More Specials is the second album by English ska band the Specials, released by 2 Tone Records in September 1980. After the success of the band's debut album, band member Jerry Dammers assumed the role as the band's leader and stirred them into expanding their 2 Tone sound into other genres of music, most prominently a lounge music and easy listening style inspired by Muzak. Several band members disagreed with Dammers' vision and brought their own influences to the album, including from northern soul and rockabilly, contributing to an eclectic sound palette. The relations between band members continued to sour into the album's accompanying tour and most of the band departed in 1981.
The album features collaborations with the Go-Go's members Belinda Carlisle, Charlotte Caffey, and Jane Wiedlin; Rhoda Dakar from the Bodysnatchers; and Lee Thompson from Madness. The lyrics on the album, as with the band's debut album, are often intensely political. Upon its release, the album alienated some fans, but reached number 5 on the UK Albums Chart, while its singles reached the top 10 of the UK Singles Chart. The album also reached number 98 on the Billboard 200 albums chart. Critics greeted the album with praise, where journalists felt the album marked a bold step for the band. It has been since cited as an influence on the trip hop genre in the 1990s, and has been re-released several times.
Background
Formed in Coventry in 1977, the Specials were the originators of 2 Tone music, a style that mixed the Jamaican genres of ska and reggae with the attitude and energy of punk rock and a focus on politically and socially conscious lyrics. They began 2 Tone Records, partly named for the band's multiracial line-up, on which they released their debut single "Gangsters" in 1979, which reached the UK Singles Chart top 10. The subsequent debut album The Specials (1979) was a critical and commercial success, while the Too Much Too Young EP released in early 1980 reached number one on the UK Singles Chart.
By early-mid-1980, after six months of touring, the band were physically exhausted and felt they could not sustain the large amount of energy required to be in the band, but they had a schedule to adhere to; Chrysalis Records, the owner of 2 Tone Records, were hurrying the band into recording their second album, while managers wanted the band to tour in Europe, Japan and the United States. Various deals, including large concerts, TV programmes and a feature film, also needed to be discussed. Bassist Horace Panter recalled: "Decisions needed to be made, and all we wanted to do was sleep. We didn't have any choice. We had to learn to enjoy the ride or get off, and nobody wanted to get off!"
A new single was required, so the band released "Rat Race", written by guitarist Roddy Byers as a critique on how privileged students "would spend three years pissing it up in college, knowing full well that Daddy would get them a good job when they left no matter what." With Linton Kwesi Johnson's "Me Wan' Fi Go Rave" as a musical starting point, band founder and keyboardist Jerry Dammers added a plucked piano intro inspired by John Barry, foreshadowing his primary direction on More Specials. The single was a success, reaching number 5 on the UK charts. Meanwhile, drummer John Bradbury wanted to record a solo single, a cover version of the northern soul track "Sock It to 'em J.B.", imagining the titular initials changing from James Bond to John Bradbury. The band recorded it with him at Tulse Hill, and though it was not released as a single, it did make it onto More Specials.
For the band's second album, Dammers wanted to move the band's sound forward, away from ska and towards new territory. He declared: "It's time for 2-Tone bands to begin getting experimental. Some of the home-grown ska has started to become a cliche. We've got to start all over again." He reflected years later: "Ska was just a launching point. I didn't want us to end up like Bad Manners." For Dammers, this change meant he could pursue his fascination with easy listening and mood music, both "background sounds not designed for active listening, but which, if you paid attention, turned out to be weird, even creepy," according to writer Simon Reynolds. In particular, he was interested in Muzak. Band member Neville Staple said this was a reflection of the band's constant touring abroad: "We were in aeroplanes too much, man, and hotels! We were hearing that kind of elevator music, those drum-machine beats, everywhere we went. You soak up what surrounds you." In Dammers' own recollection, he had been inspired by listening to the styles while on tour in America in particular; in 2009, he reflected:
Recording Unlike the first Specials album, which was produced by Elvis Costello in a raw fashion, Jerry Dammers himself produced More Specials with Dave Jordan, except for "Sock It to 'em J.B." which was produced by Bradbury. It was recorded during summer 1980 at Coventry's Horizon Studios and mixed at Wessex Studios in London. In contrast to the first album, More Specials was predominately crafted in the studio, as, in his pursuit of musical perfection, Dammers had become infatuated with the idea of a recording studio and the possibilities it presented for numerous overdubs and fine tuning. Consequently, More Specials is more producer-dominated than the band's previous work. According to Panter, Dammers would listen to any music with an open mind, feeling that no matter whether he initially thought the music was good or bad, he would grow to like it with repeated plays. His ambition with More Specials was to destroy people's preconceived ideas of good and bad music to the point where listeners would hear a record and "won't even know if they like it or not." Panter said the band's intention was to become "more international."
Several band members opposed Dammers' proposed "Muzak-lounge jazz experiment". Byers was moving into a different direction in his fusions of ska with rockabilly, contributing to a difference of opinion which destroyed his friendship with Dammers. While Byers acknowledged Dammers as having had the determination and vision to start the band, he felt he wanted to dominate the band and "run everything himself," with group manager Rick Rogers serving merely to interpret Dammers' ideas. The guitarist stated he wanted to start his own band to play his rockabilly-styled rock and roll, which would have been stylistically consistent with acts like Stray Cats who were becoming popular in London. Consequently, he had begun creating songs in punk rock and power pop styles, while Bradbury's interest in northern soul remained intact, thus contributing to the varied sound of the final album.
Regardless, as Dammers was the band's production mastermind, he dominated the recording. Byers reflected that, with More Specials, the Specials "went from With the Beatles to Sgt. Pepper's without doing Rubber Soul," a comment Panter found to be "very pertinent," who noted that: "[Dammers would] often say we've done that, now let's do something else. And other people would say, hey we've got this great thing going on here, why are we doing something different? That was probably the beginning of the fracturing of the band." During recording, Dammers had a heated row with Bradbury, who wanted to do a "2 Tone review, mixing ska, soul and reggae," which Panter also advocated. Recording was also hindered by outside interference, including when a journalist entered the studio to interview the band, who felt the interruption had sabotaged the "vibe" of the song they were working on. Further contributing factors to the dark tone of More Specials were the drink and drug-related issues within the band, racial squabbles in the audience of the band's live shows and guitarist Lynval Golding being victim to a violent racist attack.
For his experiments in Muzak, the "cheesy" tone of the pre-recorded rhythms on Dammers' newly bought Yamaha home organ, especially the Latin-America rhythms, were integral to his vision. For the Muzak-style tracks, including "Stereotypes", "I Can't Stand It" and "International Jet Set", the band sacrificed the live 'ensemble' recording of their first album for a "one instrument at a time" multitrack recording style, firstly laying down the keyboard and drum tracks, then adding bass, then guitar, and so on, contributing to a "totally different feel to the music" that Panter disliked.
Composition More Specials is more adventurous than the band's debut, given the disparate influences of their members, and comprises an eclectic mix of songs written by different members, including Terry Hall's first composition, several cover versions, Dammers' experiments in muzak and electronica and some "rockabilly mod" material from Byers. Louder Than War wrote that the album was "ambitious and totally unique, expanding the group’s musical palette into areas never previously explored in 'rock' music," citing the inclusion of gloomy lounge, dub reggae, muzak, dark exotica, calypso, bossa nova, northern soul and Spaghetti Western music. The group also incorporated inflections of jazz and soul into their sound, and flourishes of Mariachi flugelhorn are provided by guest musician Dick Cuthell. Simon Reynolds described the record as a "ragbag of revivalisms" and "a motley compromise" between band members. More Specials is split into two distinct sides; Panter stated that side one is the "songs side" and side two is the "muzak side."
The album is nonetheless dominated by Dammers and his Muzak-inspired direction, to the extent where The Rough Guide to Rock considers the record to be a venture into lounge music, while critic Scott Plagenhoef describes the album as "lounge-inspired post-punk." Dammers saw his contributions as "a DIY punk appropriation of Muzak." His preferential musical textures on More Specials are, according to Nick Reynolds of BBC Music, "odd and particularly British," citing the "basic rhythm boxes, brass sections in full cry, and a variety of cheesy keyboards and fairground and cinema organs." The record has also been described as avant-pop. Contrasting the often upbeat music, the record's lyrics are comparably bleak, depicting English life "in all its drab, suffocating despair and there's no way out," according to Nick Reynolds. John Lewis of Uncut wrote that, compared to the "teenage male fear writ large" on the band's first album, More Specials "presents a dread that’s more existential than adolescent." Critic Vivien Goldman nonetheless commented that the band's bleak world view is presented with humour: "This may be the funniest record of 1980."
Side one
Side one is eclectic, incorporating energetic ska ("Enjoy Yourself"), northern soul ("Sock It to 'em J.B."), reggae ("Do Nothing") and a "kitsch singalong" ("Pearl's Cafe"). The album is bookended by two cover versions of music hall standard "Enjoy Yourself (It's Later than You Think)." Nick Reynolds writes that the irony behind recording the song is "very black indeed." In the version that opens the album, the song is upbeat, with inventive drumming from Bradbury, but ironically hints at the nation's then-fear of a potentially impending nuclear war. Indicating the band's move away from ska, the song's horn arrangements are said by Goldman to "evoke Bernard Herrmann and the Northern Dance Orchestra more than the cool jerk at Studio One."