Customer Reviews

Walking in the Sunshine/Best of Bad Manners

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

An excellent release by a nearly-forgotten classic band. Bad Manners were stereotyped as the novelty act of the 2-Tone period, but if you listen to this double album you'll struggle to understand why.

Here is an album of fantastic music, of solid music, music you can dance to, music you can listen to again and again, with just that little edge of stupidity to it.

These CDs are full of classics: two top-fives, two top-tens, some top-twenties, top-forties, and a host of album tracks that demonstrate that Buster & co were more than the mere clowns they were made out to be. A quick check of their 'hayday' albums will show that they tended towards a rough 50-50 mix of originals and cover versions, much like many of the 2-Tone ska bands they were associated with; but take out the tracks they didn't compose and you'll still have a compilation of true brilliance here.

If you compare this album with their only other (to date) 'genuine' retrospective, "Magnetism: Very Best of", you'll find some small but important differences. The first is the most obvious: this is a double CD, whereas "Magnetism" is only one disc. The second is that "Magnetism" contains the brilliant "That'll Do Nicely", and this compilation weirdly misses it out. This is easily made up for however by the next difference: on "WITS - The Best Of...", you'll find the discs packed with high quality album tracks and B-sides that you'll struggle to find elsewhere. Finally, the great Rhoda Daker's sleeve notes and a couple of pictures put it all into context and remind you what a great band Bad Manners really were.

Kudos for including the mental "Educating Marmalade", but some lyrics would have helped tremendously. I know there's a lot of songs included here, but from time to time Buster's enunciation wasn't the clearest of any lead singer in the world.

One more thing: this is NOT a re-mix or a live album. These are the originals. Sad songs? - Well I've heard too many. Buy this album instead!

Here's the track listing. Had they thrown in a 3rd CD with some of the newer stuff - from the late 1980s- 200x then it would have made it THE Compilation to own. Still, this set has its moments as it is not a carbon copy of the others, and the original studio versions are used instead of the crappy live ones.
CD 1
1 Ne-Ne Na-Na Na-Na Nu-Nu
2 My Girl Lollipop (My Boy Lollipop)
3 Special Brew
4 Walking In The Sunshine
5 Buona Sera
6 Woolly Bully
7 Lip Up Fatty
8 Can Can
9 Inner London Violence
10 Scruffy, The Huffy Chuffy Tugboat
11 Got No Brains
12 Just A Feeling
13 Tequila
14 Lorraine
15 Echo Gone Wrong
16 Suicide
17 The Under Adventures Of Ivor The Engine
18 Just Pretendin'
CD 2
1 Magnificent 7
2 King Ska Fa
3 Weeping And Wailing
4 Ben E Wriggle
5 Runaway
6 Never Will Change
7 Only Funkin'
8 End Of The World
9 Gherkin
10 Samson And Delilah
11 Echo 4-2
12 Psychedelic Eric
13 Exodus
14 Fatty Fatty
15 Holiday
16 Night Bus To Dalston
17 Educating Marmalade
18 Falling Out Of Love

This is about as good a compilation as one can hope for given Bad Manners' relative obscurity. I give it 4 stars alone for including the best-ever cover of Tequila. Why they are the forgotten Brit Ska band I'll never understand.

The song selections are very good, especially the choices from Looney Tunes. A few more of them (Doris, Spy I, and El Pussycat, for example) and this would be a truly great compilation.

If you like Bad Maners this is the best compilation available.

I have A LOT of Bad Manners, think I know them about as well as an American can, but I'm not quite sure WHAT this compilation is. It seems to be a mishmash of thrown together tracks, live and otherwise. Is it authorized by Bad Manners even? "Skarville?" "Hokey Cokey?" "I Just Wanna Bang on a Drum?" At least find out the songs' names. It's pretty forgettable, I bought it, downloaded it and listened to (most of it) about once. For $6.99 not bad, I guess, but don't expect miracles. Track down Forging Ahead, Mental Notes, Heavy Petting or Stupidity and you'll do much better.

Because this wonderful band just slaps music snobs like me in the face now and again and reminds me that it's good for me.

highly recommended compilation from the wild and wonderful Bad Manners. it's true, all original studio recordings, selected from their first four albums, including some b-sides, and featured songs from the elusive "loonee tunes!" & "gosh it's..." releases. an action packed double disc set, filled with a very satisfying variety of material. see demonmusicgroup.co.uk for full track list.