{"id":164076,"date":"2022-12-21T09:28:02","date_gmt":"2022-12-21T09:28:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/terry-hall-singer-and-songwriter-front-man-of-the-specials-dies-at-63\/"},"modified":"2022-12-21T09:28:02","modified_gmt":"2022-12-21T09:28:02","slug":"terry-hall-singer-and-songwriter-front-man-of-the-specials-dies-at-63","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/terry-hall-singer-and-songwriter-front-man-of-the-specials-dies-at-63\/","title":{"rendered":"Terry Hall, singer and songwriter front man of the Specials, dies at 63"},"content":{"rendered":"
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LONDON \u2014 Terry Hall, the British musician and lead singer in the late 1970s ska-punk band the Specials, has died at 63, the group announced Monday<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The songwriter \u2014 who left school at 15 and became a leader of the British punk scene by 22 \u2014 died following an illness, according to the band’s statement. No further details were disclosed.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Mr. Hall’s best-known hits with the second-wave ska revival group include \u201cGangsters\u201d (1979), \u201cToo Much Too Young\u201d (1980) and \u201cGhost Town\u201d (1981), a track whose bleak lyrics came to embody the sense of alienation gripping England’s postindustrial towns and cities. It was a haunting soundtrack to the summer of riotous unrest that gripped neighborhoods in the country’s cities one month after its release.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Thousands of mostly Black young people clashed in riots with police officers in more than 20 British cities that summer, as unemployment rates soared and tensions with police boiled over, resulting in the arrests of more than 1,200 people.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cGhost Town,\u201d which catapulted the Specials to wide recognition, was recorded over 10 days in April 1981 in central England’s Leamington Spa, according to a history of the band shared on its website.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cIt captured how we were feeling \u2014 not just in Coventry, but we were touring in the north and saw all these factories closing down, all these people becoming unemployed,\u201d Mr. Hall told the Big Issue magazine in a 2021 interview.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The track, which spent three weeks at the top of the British charts, was ultimately what led the band to breaking up \u2014 a decision made by its members in a dressing room following a live musical appearance on the television program \u201cTop of the Pops, \u201d the Specials said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cWe were expected to get a gold disc for that record, but I found that pretty horrible. Why do we need that reward?\u201d Mr. Hall recalled in the 2021 interview. \u201cOur country’s in a mess, do you like my gold record? It felt like the perfect moment to stop.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cWe’d gone from seven kids in the back of a van to being presented with gold discs,\u201d he added, \u201cand I never felt massively comfortable with that.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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In addition to being the frontman with the Specials \u2014 which disbanded in 1981 before regrouping in 2009 \u2014 Mr. Hall performed with bands Fun Boy Three, the Colorfield and Vegas.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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