The Toasters

The Toasters Tuesday, January 31, at the Odeon.
Modern ska's greatest asset is a sense of its own mortality and an insistence that death hasn't come for it just yet. Supporters are energized by a refusal to surrender to fashion and the pride of knowing they rescued ska from post-third-wave oblivion.

The Toasters, one of the States' finest ska bands, also exemplify the genre's tenacity. Following In Retrospect, 2003's best-of collection, and a consistently surging tour schedule, the Toasters spent their free time slowly piecing together a proper Enemy follow-up -- on this tour, five new songs will complement their back catalog of 13 studio full-lengths. Despite many lineup changes over the years (almost 50 musicians have called themselves Toasters at one time or another), the group's approach to 2-Tone, R&B-inflected ska hasn't changed much at all.

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