The Green Room Rockers - Hoosier Homegrown

I first heard of the Green Room Rockers by chance when I received a various “Jump Up Records” comp from those good people at Do The Dog in with an order I had placed. I really liked their contributing track, the funky soul edged “Hoosier Homegrown” and was really keen to hear more and now eventually I’ve got round to it and here is my thoughts.
The band play a mix of 60’s soul, rocksteady and ska much like the Slackers and Aggrolites, with lyrics much the same….booze, parties, women and everyday life problems. The LP kicks off at quite an energetic pace, and I’m sure their drummer has been studying at the John Bradbury School of Drumming, with his machine gun rattling, rimshot drum rolls.
By 4th track ‘Northbound Train’ the pace slows down a bit….just a bit mind…..and the start of this track had me thinking of Big Youth for some reason. This is then followed by my induction tune ‘Hoosier Homegrown’.
‘Humour Me’ sees us back on a more traditional reggae sounding ground which is followed by the acoustic ‘Divided’ which is a bit of a round the camp fire sing a long. ‘Fight For Your Love’ finds the band in more melancholy mood, but not about to give up in the forbidden love stakes. While next up ‘Everyday’ starts off as a slow bluesy tune, before bursting in to an upbeat ska tempo about suffering the “same old sh*t” everyday.
The next track is ‘Untitled’ a ska instrumental with a subtle Latin flavour. ‘Pieces’ and then ‘Cool Rocksteady’ bring things to an end, the first of a bubbly little ska number again before the final track brings your pulse and everything down to a more normal level.
The musicianship on the LP is good with a tight horn section and a keyboardist up there with Jerry Dammers, Mike Barso and James Taylor (JTQ…not the other one!!) as well as mentioned before a good solid drummer.
I just hope however, that although I have not had the pleasure of catching this lot live, hopefully they are as energetic with their shows as they’ve managed to portray themselves here, because that has always been a problem with The Slackers for me, great live but never really captured that raw energy very well in their recordings. This LP packs a real punch and although not bringing anything really new to the table, what they have done is done really well, and now I have an uncontrollable desire to catch ‘em live!