The Beat Starring Dave Wakeling, The Queen’s Hall, Edinburgh

The Beat exploded into the charts in 1979 with their ska-influenced cover of Smokey Robinson and The Miracles’ Tears Of A Clown, issuing a fistful of classic singles and a trio of top-quality albums before imploding in 1983. Singers Dave Wakeling and Ranking Roger went in to form General Public before a rather messy arrangement saw The Beat bifurcate into The Beat featuring Ranking Roger and The Beat starring Dave Wakeling until Roger’s untimely death in 2019. With the deaths of saxophone player Saxa and drummer Everett Morton, Wakeling now remains the sole original member.

Forced to tour in America as The English Beat, ironically the current version of the band is largely comprised of players from Los Angeles and Mexico, with Wakeling and fellow frontman Antonee First Class (possibly not the name on his birth certificate) the only English members.

Opening with a cover of Prince Buster’s Rough Rider, the band settles into a setlist stuffed with classic Beat Hits. If Wakeling, once renowned as a political firebrand with chiseled good looks now carries the demeanor of your Uncle Dave at your cousin’s wed- ding reception, Antonee’s energy more than makes up for it. In any case, this is a set of songs that speaks for itself.

Twist and Crawl, Hands Off She’s Mine, Best Friend; remember when pop music was sharp, smart and fun? The audience does and they lap up every note. The band is sharp, smart, and fun too, sax player Matt Morish has Saxa’s staccato sax tone nailed down and the rhythm section of Brian Nucci Cantrell on drums and Brad Engstrom on bass are tight yet supple just as they should be.

While Wakeling’s singing and guitar playing remain on point, his between-song banter seems a little forced and over-rehearsed, the price to pay for playing the same songs night after night, year after year I suppose. But then again if it’s not broken, and it certainly isn’t, then why fix it?

Never likely to attract a Tory-loving audience, Stand Down Margaret, mashed up with Prince Buster’s Whine and Grine, is met as rapturously as you would expect with Wakeling commenting that with a cost of living crisis and the looming prospect of nuclear armageddon, not much seems to have changed.

And still, the hits keep coming: Too Nice To Talk To, Doors Of Your Heart, Ranking Full Stop, and, perhaps best of all, Mirror In The Bathroom. Tears Of A Clown is, of course, saved for the encore after which Wakeling takes his leave, leaving Antonee to lead the band through an extended version of The Pioneers’ Jackpot to close the show. It’s those hits that you go home singing though. It may be forty years since the band first broke up but a great song never dies and there have been more than a few to choose from tonight.