Never met him, but a very lovely guy, so I'm told

I saw AEOC not long after attending my 1st rock gig, and I must admit I preferred them to Dodgy 😉 (I'd grown up at jazz gigs, so seeing a bunch of hairy men playing guitars through distorted speakers - Dodgy were surprisingly noisy in '92! - was more of a shock to the system than free jazz)

Same! And made by a Waitrose chef too. I felt like I was in a Richard Curtis movie

Aren't they the same band? 😉 When John Linnel jotted down the line "build a little bird house in your soul" he laid the foundations for the entire Anticon movemnt

Someone once tried to put me off Themselves by describing them as Barenaked Ladies but with MPCs, which actually made me a) like them even more, and b) give Barenaked Ladies a proper listen

Oh god, yeah. Keith. Back to the drawing board

I'm no longer interested in musical links unless they connect to Cymande 😉

In the meantime, the first time I met Lynval I don't know if he could see I was a bit star struck, but he broke the ice by confiding in me how star struck he was having been introduced to Neil Diamond the previous night

It's kind of mad that he was one of the members who weren't interested in playing old ska and rocksteady tunes when they formed

They may well have been!

Still the most mind blowing gig I've attended was the Art Ensemble with the Chicago Blues Tradition in the early 90s. I went out and stocked up on as much of their stuff as I coul;d get my hands on soon after

Various 2 Tone luminaries cite King as a major influence on their ethos and musical direction, and it wouldn't have happened if he hadn't left Cymande who formed after Patrick left The Rudies who worked with Dandy who recorded with Crawford who released covers of 2 Tone songs. Tired now, bye

Back in Coventry, King formed a number of soul, funk and disco bands through the 1970s which became a crucible for a number of local musicians. Pharoah's Kingdom featured guitarist Lynval Golding and drummer H Bembridge, while Nite Train included guitarist Neol Davies and organist Jerry Dammers

The Specials of course enlisted trombonist Rico Rodriguez who played on Dandy's original version of Rudy, but the 2 Tone connection runs deeper. Rico and Dandy worked with a backing group called The Rudies in the 60s who featured guitarist Patrick Patterson who'd go on to form Cymande in the 1970s