Recap: Vintage Jamaican Music Soundclash

It has been a thrilling night at YAAM on the 7th of September. On very short notice the lineup changed due to reasons beyond everyones control, Tiny T was replaced by Team Right on Time (Alex Fireball & Thee Snufferer) who ran against Mr. Mass and Thomas Eiene (Get Ready, 60’s Reggae Club, Oslo). The evening started with a very nice warmup by Rudewoi and as usual in Berlin, the place filled up quite late. But as the clash rules were reported by The Rhythm Ruler and the order was decided by lot the venue was crowded and once the first round started the audience went mad. After 3x 10 minutes of real heavyweight Ska the audience voted for Thomas. The second round was all about Rocksteady with a little controversy as Team ROT played Crucifixion by Lloyd Matador, which – although a DJ cut from the 70s – was accepted by The Rhythm Ruler as the original tune Israelites in his opinion is a Rock Steady tune. This round was taken by Mr. Mass and a heated third round started. Mr. Mass did some great toasting in this round, Thomas received a huge forward for playing some tunes with serious clash lyrics but Team ROT was in favour of the audience with their selection when it was about to decide for a winner. As this meant a draw after the first three rounds, an extra round with no style limitation was played and the result was extremly close: Mr. Mass was voted into the final tune fe tune but according to the meter and the ears of Panza & The Rhythm Ruler, Thomas and Team ROT received the same amount of noise. The audience had to decide once more and voted for Team ROT to proceed to the final tune fe tune. Team ROT started the tune fi fune with Wailers – Rock My Boat which got a huge forward so they couldnt resist to break 2 rules of the tft, tunes should be played 30 sec mimimum and no pull ups during this round. It was pure heat from now on and another tune caused a big controversy. Mr. Mass played ‘You sent me’ by the Enchanters although it was already played by Thomas in the very first round. The clash experienced part of the audience requested a disqualification but as there was no such rule presented to the competitors in the beginning it was not even a foul – lessons to be learned by the judges for a possible next edition. Team ROT was in such a heat that they played their 2nd tune without waiting for the voting, the original plan was to vote after each tune during tft. But as nobody, neither crowd or 1 of the contenters seemed to object, Panza as 2nd judge decided to not interrupt the clash but keep the musical fight going and do an overall voting after each team played their 5 tunes. The 5 rounds ended in a draw – no chance to decide for a winner at that point. A bonus round was started and Team ROT dropped the tune that made them conquer the trophy – check the video and find out.