Super Special Contest Announcement: Be a Dick for a Day

I love The Specials.  If I had a time machine, I’d be the good looking dude in the pork pie hat in the front row in London in 1979, shaking my ass and pulling on my suspenders.  “Ghost Town” is a top-ten all-time single, “Too Much Too Young” is the least douchey political song ever and if you’re not singing along during “Blank Expression” you’ve got no soul.  ((where) Where did you get that (blank) blank expression on your face?)  While they probably helped to foist a bunch of mediocre music on the world in the nineties (I’m looking right at you, Gwen Stefani), I still love them without condition or limit.

The good news: The Specials are playing thirteen dates this year in celebration of their thirtieth anniversary.

The bad news: All of the shows are in England.  Kevin and I live in Ohio.  James lives in Chicago.  None of us live in England.  To paraphrase Chris Rock, the only thing I know about England is that it’s far; England is so far there are still pilgrims on their way here.

The contest: Since we’re too hard-up to fly to England to catch The Specials, go in our place, take a ton of pictures, write 1000 words on the experience and mail it to us.  We’ll take the best submission, post it on the site, and crown the contest winner an honorary dick.  Send us an address and we’ll even send you a press pass that you can show all your friends.  We’re giving you a ton of time to get your shit together, as the first show isn’t until November.  Maybe you already live in England and were going to catch a show anyway.  Now you can punch that experience up a bit by writing about it on the internet.  Maybe you’re a millionaire and can just take your helicopter to England.  Maybe you’re an honest to god journalist and want to explore a new venue for your work.  However it works out, we’re interested in what you have to say.

To sum up: Go see The Specials.  Write about it.  Send it to us.  We’ll pick a good one and post it.  Let us know if you have questons.  Good luck.

To get you in the mood, we’ve got a couple of classic live tracks, courtesy of these classy gents.

“Nite Klub” – The Specials – Live, 1980

“Too Hot” – The Specials – Live, 1980