Interview with Kevin Long of Los Angeles Mod/Ska band The Untouchables

Well ska-lovers! This is my first post. Gabe invited me to contribute to this blog and I happily accepted. It's the best one out there to be sure! I've posted this to my other blog and thought it would make a great addition to this one as well.

Thanks Gabe for drawing me into your madness and here goes:

A long and in depth interview with Kevin Long of Los Angeles Mod/Ska band The Untouchables came up on my Goggle Alert today. I love how that little piece of technology works! Well I figured I'd give it a shout out here since it's a pretty good article.

The Untouchables were on the forefront of U.S. Ska in the early 80's. Along with Fishbone, The Toasters and The Terrorists (from NYC - while not big by any means a personal favorite of mine) they founded the way for U.S. Ska to flourish. I still have my "Free Yourself" picture disc in the shape of a 44 magnum displayed proudly in my house. Watch out people - I've got a gun!



They were signed to Stiff Records (If It Aint Stiff It aint Worth A FUCK!) at one point with Madness and released more then a few mod/ska/scooter rally favorites over the years including "I Spy For The F.B.I.", "Tropical Bird", "The General" and "Free Yourself".

You may also remember the band from their appearance in the cult classic flick "Repo Man" where you can see the whole gang hit the streets on their Vespa scooters (wish I still had mine!). Where have the scooter boys gone?



The band with lone remaining member Jerry Miller still manages to play out and about these days. There is even talk about putting something more concrete together as well.

Here is the exclusive interview with Kevin Long of Los Angeles Mod/Ska band The Untouchables:

"The influence of 2-Tone outside of the UK remains one of its most enduring legacies. In fact, the speed with which the sounds born and made in Coventry, Birmingham and London made their way across the Atlantic Ocean to the U.S. is astounding.

In the matter of just a few short months in early 1980, like minded groups of people in New York, Chicago, LA as well as places as far afield as Portland, Oregon and Arizona heard these records and were moved to start their own bands. These new bands used the 2-Tone sound, look and ethic to kick-start a purely American version of ska which featured a combination of 60's mod, R&B, power pop, rock and reggae."

Read More Here: http://marcoonthebass.blogspot.com. It's well worth the time and a very interesting read if you are at all into early 80's mod, ska and scooters! Did I mention that this cat is also the Bass player for Bigger Thomas and his blog is full of great photos and information. Check it out!

Read More at Wikipedia.

Check out their myspace page HERE.

Here's the video for the already mentioned gun shaped picture disc.