Friday, October 17, 2008

Rhoda Dakar - The First Lady of 2-Tone Is Back With A UK Tour


Rhoda Dakar began her career as lead vocalist with The Bodysnatchers. Their first single, "Do Rocksteady", b/w "Ruder Than You," written by Rhoda and Gaz "Rockin Blues" Mayall, took them into the UK pop charts (#22 in 1980) and onto Top of the Pops. The Bodysnatchers only released one more single "Easy Life" b/w "Too Experienced" and contributed a live version of "Easy Life" for the the "Dance Craze" film soundtrack (the film about 2-Tone included the live tracks "007 (Shanty Town)" and "Let's Do The Rocksteady").

Rhoda also had a UK hit solo single on 2-Tone Records with "The Boiler" backed by the Special AKA, before becoming a full member of Special AKA and appearing on their album "In The Studio" and the history-changing single "Free Nelson Mandela".

Since then, Rhoda has worked with artists as varied as Apollo 440 and Dr Robert of the Blow Monkeys fame. However, for the last few years, she has revisited her 2-Tone roots, guesting with The Selecter and appearing on a 3 Men + Black acoustic 2-Tone tour with Dave Wakeling (The Beat) and Roddy Radiation (The Specials), as well as, Pauline Black and Nick Welsh of The Selecter. Recently she was very proud to have been asked by the legendary Trojan Records to write a foreword for the latest release in their Reggae Sisters series, entitled 'Let Me Tell You Boy'. Rhoda will also be featured on atleast one track of the new Madness album "The Liberty of Norton Folgate".

Rhoda's first solo album, 'Cleaning In Another Woman's Kitchen', was released in May 2007. The album has been recorded and written with Nick Welsh. Here is a video of Rhoda performing an acoustic ska version of The Bodysnatchers song "Easy Life" that was recorded in April of 2008 with Nick Welsh of Skaville UK:



Rhoda is touring the UK with Skaville UK which includes ex-members of Bad Manners. The tour dates are below:

Oct 28 2008
TUC - Congress House
London

Oct 31 2008
The White Hart (with Skaville UK)
Caldicot, Gwent

Nov 1 2008
Queen’s Hall (with Skaville UK)
Narbeth

Nov 8 2008
The Railway (with Skaville UK)
Burnham on Sea

Nov 9 2008
Speedfreaks Ball 4 (with Skaville UK)
Mablethorpe

Nov 14 2008
Charlie Browns (with Skaville UK)
Luton

Nov 15 2008
The Rifle Club (with Skaville UK)
Portsmouth

Nov 22 2008
Rio’s (with Skaville UK) & The Beat
Leeds

Below are downloads of 2 songs from Rhoda's solo LP "Cleaning In Another Woman's Kitchen"

Rhoda Dakar - Landlord
Rhoda Dakar - Money Worries

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