COVENTRY Music Museum curator Pete Chambers BEM writes for the Observer.
Born Under A Thundering Ska at the 2-Tone Village
Some marriages were made in Heaven, some were made in Hell – but the collaboration between Tony Kinsella – stand up comedian and performance poet – and Steve O Donoghue – singer-songwriter – was made over scoops of Guinness in a Manchester pub with a vibrant ska playlist exploding from the jukebox.
Together, they will bring their latest combination of poems, stories, jokes and live music, to the 2-Tone Village in Coventry this April.
Born Under A Thundering Ska is a reverent and passionate tribute to a record label that changed the face of British music and politics.
Tony and Steve took a previous show, a tribute to The Undertones called More Jokes About Chocolate And Girls, to the Derry Playhouse Theatre in 2018, performing in front of a full house that included three actual members of the band.
Steve said: “When Tony asked me to do that gig, he neglected to mention that I’d be trying to master the chords and lyrics of Teenage Kicks and My Perfect Cousin in front of the two O Neil brothers who wrote those bloody songs!”
But the show was a smash hit and their friendship survived. And now they have turned their collective microscope onto Coventry’s great musical legacy.
Tony has performed comedy and poetry since the late 1990s and has developed shows about Kirsty MacColl, The Cranberries, The Shangri La’s, Joy Division and a forensic exploration of Bob Dylan’s celebrated ‘break-up’ album, Blood On The Tracks.
“I grew fascinated about one of the world’s most renowned protest singers producing a whole album about his marriage coming to an end,” added Tony.
“So I used it to explore my own roller coaster relationships – some of it deeply confessional, most of it to crowbar in some jokes.”
He also wrote and performed a show about Hamburg’s Socialist football club, FC St Pauli, called ‘Don’t Fear The Reeperbahn’.
The common thread throughout Tony’s projects is left-of-centre politics, so the 2-Tone label’s social, cultural and musical significance, at a time of high unemployment, rampant racism and ‘too much fighting on the dance floor’ has proved a natural fit.
“I don’t know what’s taken me so long,” said Tony.
“As soon as I saw The Specials bouncing around the stage and blasting out Gangsters on Top of the Pops, I knew that it changed everything.”
Steve is a sought-after singer-songwriter who has crossed paths with Tony many times across Manchester’s performance circuit. He has supported such A-listers as Squeeze, Aztec Camera, The
Christians and Martin Stephenson and the Daintees, as well as headlining his own gigs and releasing several albums of original songs.
“I’m an introspective singer-songwriter….so it’s not going to end well!”
So, come and join Tony and Steve in their tuneful, poetic and sometimes very funny, but always deeply heartfelt, journey through the music of The Specials, The Selecter, The Beat, Madness and The Bodysnatchers.
They guarantee there will be no blank expression on your face.
Come and see what the fuss is all about April 27 at Knight’s Bar at the 2-Tone Village.
Doors open at 6.30pm for a 7pm show time – and it’s FREE!
