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Music Review Roy Ellis, 100 Club, London

Ska veteran shows that he can still whip an audience into shape

ROY ELLIS’S age is undisclosed but his undiminished talent is not.

 Roy Ellis
Undiminished: Roy Ellis

With a voice unsullied by the years, the self-titled Mr Symarip — a singer and trombonist with the 1960s ska band of that name — is still going strong and at the 100 Club he entertains a loyal following eager to hear his old and new stuff.

It was Symarip’s brilliant 1969 anthem Skinhead Moonstomp that most people came to hear and it is duly provided at the end, by which time half the audience are on stage singing along vociferously.

Along the way there are plenty of other landmark Symarip tunes including Skinhead Girl and the wistful Stay With Him, the highlight of the night.

In between, and to prove that even at advanced age he is not resting on his laurels, there are tracks  from Ellis’s new album Almighty Ska, notably its sort-of-title song, Ska Almighty.

And he delivers some reminiscences from the old days, including how payment for one of his more popular songs ran to nothing more than a slap-up Chinese dinner.

Silver-suited in front of a sharp seven-piece band that included New Order’s Peter Hook in its ranks, Ellis shows that he still knows how to work an audience, even if he does have to “rewind” on Skinhead Moonstomp when he loses track of the words.

Credit to promoters Human Punk for bringing past and present so skilfully together on such a night. This is one of their regular ventures at the 100 Club that highlights the neglected — and conveniently forgotten —  interface between the British working class and Jamaican culture.

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