When does a genre of music become overground?  How many records do you need to sell to stop being underground?  All questions plenty of genres deal with day in day out and year in year out.  From the origins of Ska to today there have always been plenty of bands skanking it out.  Politics or just goofy misfits acting out Ska covered it all.

‘Pick It Up! Ska In The 90s’ just about covers a whole scene with the movers and shakers playing their part and covering the story in detail.  A thoroughly enjoyable movie that gives the back story and takes on all comers using the people who were in the trenches from Tim Armstrong narrating to No Doubt being included along side the big players from The Specials to Operation Ivy to Reel Big Fish and Blink 182 right up to today’s players like Aimee Interrupter.

Focusing on the 90s explosion this film is a great two hours of musical education thats a comprehensive coverage.  Regardless of if you like or love or can’t get into it at all its a really engaging flick. I particularly like how fondly and honestly the main players talk about the scene.  When it went from the top of the scene right back down to going underground its a great story and the flow is really good.

As far as music films go its watchable and informative cramming a hell of a lot of detail into just over an hour and a half its great to see the likes of Roddy Radiator getting screen time to tell his story alongside how No Doubt broke out they give props to the likes of Operation Ivy through to Rancid and their contribution.  who knew Goldfinger played 385 shows in a single year! Amazing stuff.

Someone describes it as like a pendulum swing and I like that because its spot on from grunge to ska punk to nu metal back to rock to indie and back round again.  the endurance of some of the bands like The Slackers and Rancid has no doubt helped bands like The Interrupters and Bar Stool Preachers who are coming through and will be the next generation to challenge the BossTones and thats cool and as it should be and to see The Specials and Neville Staples filling halls in 2019 is awesome.

Check this film out its like a ray of sunshine in dark times and the soundtrack is really really good. Put on your pork pie hat and get skanking you know you want to.

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