The Selecter - Bristol Ska and Mod Festival comes to Bristol

 

The Selecter **** were first on tonight at the Bristol Mod and Ska Festival, to date it has a bit of an inauspicious start this year. Firstly it was supposed to be held at the new venue of St Phillips Gate, as was the whole Skyline Series but delayed have meant this was now in SWX added to that The Beat had been forced to pull out due to Rankin Roger being taken ill. It was up to The Selecter and From The Jam to salvage the night.

Covers have been part of the Ska cannon for a long time and this tradition was continued with the 'Stop me if you've heard this one Before' being the opening number and getting the place bouncing immediately. The only issue with a room full of bouncing people was it was about thirty degrees outside and it was not long before the air conditioning struggled, on and off the stage the heat was rising.

Slightly adding to the heat in another sense was Pauline's statement of "Fuck Tommy" in relation to the Free Tommy Robinson campaign and I can see that the head of the EDL and The Selecter are probably on different sides of this debate. He had a couple of fans in though who proceed to shout "Free Tommy" at times made a slightly charged atmosphere. On politics they did also state that Boris is a twat and to be fair that's hard to disagree with.

The tunes just get coming with the Dance floor getting more active and sweater by the second from 'Three minute Hero' to 'On my Radio'. During 'Carry go bring Home' they also had the whole venue singing along to "la la la la..." creating some great moments. Shortly before everybody evaporated due to the heat the final song of 'Too Much Pressure' signalled the end to a great set by a band that never fail to put on a show and give the crowd a great time.

Review by Jon Cooper and pictures by Steve Owen. 

Check Out! the Video for 'Missing Words' Below...