Dave & Ansel Collins - Monkey Spanner

WHO: Dave & Ansel Collins

WHAT: Monkey Spanner (Monkey Spanner-Version Two)

WHEN: 1971

LABEL: Techniques

I first got into ska and reggae about ten years ago, thanks to Nick, a guy I used to work with. He would tape late night radio 1 to listen to the next day. It was mainly modern jazz (nice!), and it didn’t do anything for me but every now and then he’d tape the late night documentaries too.  One was about Trojan Records, the legendary Jamaican record label. I think this was when the path of my musical tastes veered off on a side road and I’m still lost on a musical b-road somewhere.

I don’t remember what was said about the label, but the music was amazing. I’d listened to a tiny bit of reggae before, mainly Bob Marley, but this was different. For ages afterwards I ate up anything that was released by Trojan but not the condoms. Apparently that’s a different company. (Always thought that was a weird sideline, reggae and rubbers). Nick helped me sate this voracious appetite by bringing in some tapes to listen to. Turns out when he lived in London as a kid, his older brother was a bit of a suede-head (an offshoot of the more well known skin-heads), so he knew a bit about the genre, and shared some of the music with me. Thanks Nick!

When I saw the names, Dave & Ansel Collins, on this single as I was rummaging through another market (Tynemouth, I think) I knew the names from their more well known and first release Double Barrel (a great tune, and one I haven’t got yet, if you don’t know it listen to it here).

THE A SIDE

Although I didn’t recognize the track “Monkey Spanner” I picked it up anyway, and it turns out I had heard it before.

 “This is ……… a heavy, heavy monster sound!” announces Dave at the top of this track, not Dave Collins (they weren’t brothers). His name is Barker, but really its David Crooks. Lee “Scratch” Perry decided that Dave Barker had a better ring to it. Maybe, but I don’t think Dave agreed, otherwise the single would be by Dave Barker and Ansel Collins, and not something that makes it sound like they’re in a civil partnership. Anyway, Dave “not Collins” Barker lets us know about the imminent weighty and monstrous emanations, over a great (probably guitar) noise, and lets us know he can sing, as well as make announcements about the mass and monstrousness of the sounds. Soon after that, Mr. Collins makes his presence felt with some cool and catchy keyboard.

THE B SIDE

The B side is an instrumental version of the “Monkey Spanner”. Collins and S.Riley wrote the tune, maybe some relation to the producer of the track Winston Riley. Maybe they were married too. Probably not.

Ansel Collins was a prolific session keyboardist, playing on some of the legendary reggae tracks of the seventies. Monkey Spanner is a great tune (instrumental or otherwise), maybe not as catchy or recognisable as “Double Barrel”, but until I find a copy of that, this’ll do quite nicely.

THE VINYL

This one has no previous owners names gouged into the label and is in perfect nick as far as my inexpert eye can tell. It plays perfectly and will continue to do so whenever I feel like some classic seventies reggae.

MY VERDICT

This is a heavy, heavy monster sound and one that helped influence the 2tone revival later in the decade, as evidenced in the intro to “One Step Beyond” by Madness (Don’t watch that, watch this. This is the heavy, heavy monster sound, the nuttiest sound around…etc.).  A nice slice of classic reggae “hittin’ you right there, right there in the middle…”.