With Coventry's The Specials and Selecter, Birmingham outfit The Beat were in the vanguard of the "second wave of ska" that emanated from the Midlands at the end of the 1970s.

Taking inspiration from Jamaican artists such as Prince Buster and Desmond Dekker, they brought a fast off-beat and angry political awareness to popularity during the early days of Thatcher's Britain, which was typified by their bitter and irrepressibly catchy number Stand Down Margaret.

Almost 30 years on, frontman Dave Wakeling, writer of that and The Beat's other great songs, including Mirror In The Bathroom, has since departed Britain for a life in California, while two other founder members of the band, Andy Cox and Dave Steele, have enjoyed mega-selling success as The Fine Young Cannibals.

In their absence, original member Ranking Roger has taken centre stage.

He has been touring as The Beat, along with remaining oldtimers Dave Blockhead and Everett Morton and his son, Ranking Junior, as co-vocalist.

Although the band is now far from its heyday, the back catalogue of quick-skanking classics, including the eternally-inspired cover of Tears Of A Clown, guaranteed a night of jump-upand- down fun.

In support, Neville Staples, an original member of The Specials, provided futher evidence of the evergreen appeal of the era of ska revival.