Leaders of ska music's second wave in England during the late 1970s and early '80s, the Specials founded the 2 Tone record label, and added like-minded bands such as the Selecter, the English Beat, and Madness to the roster. Combining socially conscious messages with jaunty, danceable melodies, the Specials (later known as the Special AKA) toured with the Clash, had their first album produced by Elvis Costello, and topped the British singles charts with ska anthems "Gangsters" and "Rudi, A Message to You." At the peak of their success in 1981, internal tensions led to the group fragmenting, with members departing to form the Fun Boy Three and, later, the Special Beat.

Listen to The Specials at Finetune.

• (2008)  The Best Of The Specials
• (2007)  Stereo-Typical
• (2004)  The Singles
• (2002)  More Specials
• (2002)  The Specials

• A Message To You Rudy (2002 Digital Remaster)
• Too Much Too Young (2002 Digital Remaster)
• Gangsters
• Concrete Jungle (2002 Digital Remaster)
• Monkey Man (2002 Digital Remaster)

• Madness
• The Police
• Elvis Costello
• UB40
• Joe Jackson
• The Clash
• Sublime
• Red Hot Chili Peppers
• The Jam
• Talking Heads
• The Pretenders
• XTC
• The Cars
• The Boomtown Rats
• Bad Manners
• The Selecter
• Sting
• Blur
• 311
• John Mayer

• retromike31
• BlueGirl
• VonRude
• Bigle5
• RetroKing
• beat64
• andreix
• bazzinfly3
• stugilchrist
• pixelhook
• kuronekopiano
• tom8779654
• chad1856
• andhow
• tatsuimu
• kjoeleet
• MalShootsFirst
• akaaha
• DrSka
• hannibalchew
• HelgaPataki
• dibrown
• kosh323
• Bandulu
• eppersrd
• abighill
• holmbush
• nao
• maimai
• OGRastamon
• MattVoerman
• gag_hiyokko
• jonnyfletch
• Odilon
• olliethebastard
• intersauce
• goatboy
• johneb
• jgilchri
• rikochan
• Cnatch22
• milanadicto2006

• xfmtopmannum1 on 2007-09-22 08:58:39.250:
  being a 3rd generation mod i like the idear of a part of history such as these guys the specials being embeded into my brain i prescribe a dose fo gansters with a pinch of ghost town