The UPTONES - Maximum Ska - MP3s

First Uptones show of the amazing year, ‘007

Bring your skanking shoes.

Happy skalidays from The Uptones

Have a fun holiday season and a fantastic new year.
The Uptones New Years Resolution for 2007:
“To skank more often and harder than ever before.”

Desmond Beach Loves Ska

The entire Uptones family welcomes Desmond Alexander Beach,
Born: Saturday November 4, 2006 at 9:38 am. The proud sax playin dad Adam Beach, and his lovely wife Erin King, announce that he is already learning to skank, albeit horizontally.

Adam started playing sax for the Uptones in ‘85. You can hear him ripping it up on the Live!! 924 Gilman CD. After the Uptones split for a lengthy vacation in ‘90, Adam went on to tour with Zulu Spear, the Square Roots and other notables. When we decided the band should reform in the spring of 2002, Adam was my first call. I knew Paul and Ben were in; Charles had just moved back from New York, and we all agreed on Adam. After bit of juggling and a cross country move, Mr. Beach resumed his post as reeds genius and resident musicologist in the Uptones. For a taste of his sexy sax playin, give a listen to Physical High and East Of A Western Bay from the Live!! 924 Gilman CD.

And to enrich your music collection further, check out Adam’s page at
MP3 4U, where he is known to the world as Band Geek. And help yourself to some of the outstanding music he has found on the web.

Cheers to Desmond, Erin, Adam, and all our lovely fans.

- Eric

As seen by “The Rev” Paul Jackson

Ska has nine lives and is inherently lucky because of her trickster qualities.
She is as old as the universe and as young as revolution. As one thinks she’s been sussed out, one finds only more depths around each corner. Ska is comedy, tragedy, a stage for the fantastic and mundane. You cannot touch ska;
you are ska.

Ska is simple:
Ska is complicated.
Ska is immediate;
Ska is sublime.
Ska is oval and not square.
Ska is a method of learning to live in the moment.
Ska is stupid:
Ska is smart.

Technically, Ska is the ultimate expression of syncopation: In a bar of four beats, all big drum accents are on the backbeat (2 and 4), this includes the bass drum, no accent on the downbeat (1 and 3); secondary accents hit on the upbeats (1 and 2 and). Of course there are derivatives of this beat but this is where you start. It’s all from the backside of the beat and about lifting spirits up and dancing while grounding soul deeply.

Pelicans are very ska.

The Tao (Way) of Ska, as told by Moose

Ska originated in Jamaica.
In the ska world, “skank” is a verb.
Skanking is ska dancing.
Skanking has one rule, don’t stand still.
Colors to wear while skanking: black and white.
Two-Tone ska originated in England.
The UPTONES introduced ska to California.
Today’s ska is like a fine fruit at the top of
a very large tree.
Ska bees pollinate the trees.

Pick It Up

..and pass it on.

by singer / writer Eric Din

Finally mixed and mastered, here’s a track from our upcoming CD, Skanking Foolz Unite:

Bad Men Of Bodie

Eric says of the song:

This song was inspired by a trip to the gold country when I visited my first ghost town, Bodie, California. In this abandoned town, the boom and bust that was the Wild West was staring me in the face. As soon as I heard the story about the miners forming a 100 mule train to get their silver and gold to San Francisco disappearing, I conjured up this song about the betrayal of the brave men of Bodie by the bad men of Bodie. Ben and Matthew added their bits, and a song was born for The Uptones, which we play in our set.