| Life of the Party | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | ||||
| Studio album by | ||||
| Released | July 20, 1999 | |||
| Recorded | January 11, 1999 - January 31, 1999 | |||
| Genre | Ska | |||
| Length | 41:55 | |||
| Label | Stomp [1] | |||
| Producer | Chris Murray [2] | |||
| The Planet Smashers chronology | ||||
| ||||
| Review scores | |
|---|---|
| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic |   [3] |
| Times Colonist | 8/10 [2] |
Life of the Party is the third full-length release by the Planet Smashers, released in 1999. [4] [5]
The Gazette wrote: "Their most polished album, Life of the Party returns to the slick songwriting style popularized by the likes of the English Beat in their short but prolific career." [1]
Two-tone or 2 tone is a genre of British popular music of the late 1970s and early 1980s that fused traditional Jamaican ska music with elements of punk rock and new wave music. Its name derives from 2 Tone Records, a record label founded in 1979 by Jerry Dammers of The Specials, and references a desire to transcend and defuse racial tensions in Thatcher-era Britain: many two-tone groups, such as The Specials, The Selecter, and The Beat featured a mix of black, white, and multiracial people.
Ska punk is a fusion genre that mixes ska music and punk rock music together. Ska-core is a subgenre of ska punk that mixes ska with hardcore punk. Early ska punk mixed both 2 Tone and ska with hardcore punk. Ska punk tends to feature brass instruments, especially horns such as trumpets, trombones and woodwind instruments like saxophones, making the genre distinct from other forms of punk rock. It is closely tied to third wave ska which reached its zenith in the mid 1990s.
Neville Eugenton Staple is a Jamaican-born English singer, known for his work with the 2 Tone ska band the Specials, as well as with his own group the Neville Staple Band. He also performed with Ranking Roger in the supergroup Special Beat.
Big D and the Kids Table is a ska punk band formed in October 1995 in Boston, Massachusetts when its members converged in college. Their first release was on their own Fork in Hand Records label, but have since teamed with Springman Records and SideOneDummy. The band has been noted for its strict DIY work ethic, such as engineering, producing, and releasing their own albums and videos and self-promotion of their own shows.
The Planet Smashers are a Canadian ska punk band from Montreal. Since their formation in 1993, they have been a staple of the Montreal music scene. During the third wave of ska, they performed nationally and later internationally, with tours in the United States, Europe, and Japan. Founding member Matt Collyer helped establish Stomp Records in 1994, which featured many ska and ska punk bands, including Montreal's The Kingpins, The Flatliners, The Know How, and Bedouin Soundclash. Their music has been used in the Japanese flash series Catman, Canadian show Radio Free Roscoe, and MTV's Undergrads. Lyrics by The Planet Smashers often deal with topics such as love, partying and good times, and sometimes use tongue-in-cheek innuendo.
Dinosaur Sounds is a 2003 Catch 22 album and shows the band finally emerging from the shadow of former frontman Tomas Kalnoky. The album is a radical departure from previous work; while the band maintains its trademark aggression and inquisitive nature, the topics have steered back to rock and roll staples like relationship woes and alcohol, occasionally dabbling into the dark themes that made the band so distinctive compared to its ska contemporaries. "Beguile the Time" features a brief but powerful anti-war message, while "So Cold" sounds like a salvo being fired towards Kalnoky and his new outfit, Streetlight Manifesto.
Catman may refer to:
King Django is an American bandleader, singer, songwriter, arranger, engineer, producer, and multi-instrumentalist, especially in the genres of ska, rocksteady, reggae, dub, dancehall, rhythm & blues and soul. Other influences in his music have included traditional jazz, swing, klezmer, hardcore/punk rock, hip-hop and electronica.
Bomb the Music Industry! were an American punk rock musical collective from Baldwin, Nassau County, New York, United States. They wrote, produced, recorded, and distributed all of their music under the leadership of songwriter and producer Jeff Rosenstock.
Yellow #5 is the fifth album by Mustard Plug. It was named after the ingredient of malt liquor energy drinks, such as Sparks, Tilt, and Core.
Attack of The Planet Smashers is the second full-length release from The Planet Smashers. This is the first of three collaborations between the Planet Smashers and producer Chris Murray.
Union Label Group is a record label based in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It was formed through the merger of the smaller labels Stomp Records, 2112 Records, and Tyrant Records. Mayday! Records was later created as a genre imprint.
The Planet Smashers is a 1995 self-titled album by The Planet Smashers. It is described in Man vs Ape as 'a perfect definition of third wave punk ska'. AllMusic writer Curtis Zimmermann was less complimentary about the album, saying 'they play about three chords' and their 'mindless frat-boy lyrics' make other ska bands 'look like English professors.'
The Kingpins featuring Lorraine Muller - The Queen of Ska was a ska band from Montreal, Quebec that created Stomp Records label with fellow Montreal Ska band The Planet Smashers. The last Kingpins tour took place in 2004, after which the members of the band reformed under the name Lo and the Magnetics founded by Muller in order to reflect the drastic line-up changes that had taken place since the band's inception in 1994. During their ten-year reign, the band toured extensively in Canada, the U.S., France, Germany, Switzerland, Belgium, Italy, and Japan. They are known for their danceable ska rhythms, and their catchy song-writing abilities in both English and French.
General Rudie was a third wave ska band from Montreal, Quebec, Canada. In their nine-year career, the band released two full-length albums on Stomp Records and toured extensively throughout Canada and the United States.
Tea for the Voyage is a six-piece Canadian ska band based in Kingston, Ontario. The group has been active in the Ontario and Quebec ska scenes since 2004. The group's music blends elements from ska, reggae, punk/ska, rocksteady and jazz into an eclectic and unique mix.
Subb was a Canadian ska punk band formed in November 1992 in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Quebec. Since their beginning in the early 1990s, the band released four full-length albums, one EP and one split CD on the labels Stomp Records and Underworld Records. Though they experienced several lineup changes over the years, founding members Mart Charron and Stef Gauthier remained in the group. The band's musical style initially blended elements of punk rock, ska, and hardcore into a genre popularly known as ska punk or "ska-core," which characterized their first two albums. In 2002 they shifted gears, moving away from this sound and producing an album with a heavy pop punk influence. After a brief hiatus in 2003, the band moved back towards their ska, punk and hardcore elements.
The Brass Action was a Canadian six-piece independent band from Vancouver, British Columbia. The band played a unique style that mixes the intensity of punk rock and rockabilly with the dancy, horn driven sounds of ska.
Party Smasher Inc. is an independent record label founded by Ben Weinman of the Dillinger Escape Plan in 2009. In May 2016, Party Smasher partnered with Cooking Vinyl for global distribution.
