The Best Ska Albums of the '90s

Mercury and Big Rig put it out on 11 March 1997 with Paul Q. Kolderie and Sean Slade producing, and it went platinum off a number 27 peak — the only Bosstones record to reach the top fifty. The Impression That I Get topped Modern Rock Tracks because of one sound: baritone sax parked an octave under Dicky Barrett's gravel while the horns hit nothing but offbeats.

Self-released on Skunk Records in June 1992 and cut at California State University, Dominguez Hills, with the band and Elephant Levitation producing. Date Rape is the ska one, a clean upstroke over a walking bass that never raises its voice. Border case: as much dub and hip-hop as ska. Spotify's 22-track version follows the 1996 reissue, so Get Out! is missing.

Mojo Records carried it in 1996, produced by Jay Rifkin and John Avila; it peaked at 68 on the Billboard 200 and went gold anyway. Sell Out sets the template — a deadpan sulk of a lead vocal, horn stabs on every upbeat, then a double-time chorus that drops the skank completely. Spotify capitalises it as Turn The Radio Off.

Capitol issued the Gainesville band's major-label debut on 12 November 1996, tracked at Criteria in Miami and Mirror Image in Gainesville with Michael Rosen producing alongside the band. Automatic opens at a sprint and never lets the horn section settle into a groove; the trombone carries melody lines most ska bands would hand to a trumpet.

Matthew Wilder produced across eleven studios around Los Angeles, and it was the last record with keyboardist Eric Stefani, who had stopped attending rehearsals in September 1994. Spiderwebs opens on a bassline and a horn chart before any guitar upstroke shows up. Border case: by the time it went diamond nobody filed it under ska at all.

Hellcat Records released the Los Angeles traditionalists in 1998 and got them onto the Warped Tour, which was a strange fit for a band this unhurried. Two lead singers, Alex Désert and Greg Lee, trade lines instead of harmonising; Désert also acted in Swingers and High Fidelity. No Worries ambles along on rocksteady time with the horns voiced low and warm.

Detroit's entry, and the fastest thing here: Hollywood Records signed them and Julian Raymond and Phil Kaffel produced with the band. No Face got to 31 on Billboard's Modern Rock chart, which is odd for a song that spends its verses at hardcore tempo and only drops into a skank when the chorus needs air.

Victory Records put it out on 24 March 1998, and it is the only album by the original lineup — Tomas Kalnoky, Josh Ansley and James Egan all left later that year, and Kalnoky re-recorded the whole thing with Streetlight Manifesto in 2006. Keasbey Nights runs horn line and vocal in unison until they split, which is the trick nobody else copied properly.

New York rocksteady heads who slowed down while everyone else sped up. Vic Ruggiero's organ leads rather than decorates, and he has played keyboards and piano on several Rancid albums. Rude and Reckless keeps the bass forward and the drums lazy, horns answering the vocal in short phrases instead of riding over the top of it.

Sixth studio album from the band Robert Hingley started in 1981, after moving from England to New York and seeing the Beat at the Roseland Ballroom; when no label would have him he founded Moon Ska Records himself. 2-Tone Army is a declaration of allegiance with a dry metronomic guitar chop and horns arranged the English way, not the Californian one.

Epitaph's ska signing liked this one enough to re-record it in Spanish and release that as Firme (en Español) the following year. Charlie Brown is where the ska-core tag earns itself — a barked vocal over a thrash riff, then horns cutting in on the offbeat like a different band wandered into the room. Border case: closer to hardcore than to Jamaica.

Epic and Starpool released it on 9 September 1997 with Peter Collins producing most of the record, which reached 75 on the Billboard 200. Their Come On Eileen plays the Dexys arrangement almost straight until the horn section takes over the fiddle part, and Monique Powell sings it harder than the original ever asked for. Border case: ska-pop with a swing hangover.

Grand Rapids, Michigan, formed 1991, and Hopeless Records carried this in March 1997 — Midwestern ska with no coastal self-consciousness anywhere on it. Beer (Song) finishes the record as a basement singalong, horns doubling the vocal hook and the upstroke mixed loud enough that you can count every individual chop.

Goldenvoice and Time Bomb put it out on 28 October 1997, and the drummer billed as The Baron von Tito is Travis Barker — his only album with the band before blink-182 took him in 1998. Super Rad! sits a surf guitar under fuzzed bass and a horn line that keeps threatening to turn into a cartoon theme. Border case: costume novelty, played tight.