Rat Race (The Specials song)
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| "Rat Race" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 Cover of the single released in France | ||||
| Single by the Specials | ||||
| A-side | "Rude Buoys Outa Jail" | |||
| Released | 16 May 1980 | |||
| Recorded | Horizon Studios, Coventry | |||
| Genre | ||||
| Length | 3:07 | |||
| Label | 2 Tone Records (UK) Chrysalis (US and Europe) | |||
| Songwriter | Roddy Radiation | |||
| Producer | Dave Jordan | |||
| The Specials singles chronology | ||||
| ||||
"Rat Race" is a song by ska/2-Tone band the Specials, released on 16 May 1980 by 2 Tone Records as a double A-side single with "Rude Buoys Outa Jail". The single wasn't included on the UK release of the More Specials album, but was included on the US version, released by Chrysalis Records. The song peaked at no. 5 on the UK Singles Chart and also charted on the US Dance Chart.[2][3]
"Rat Race" is a critique on how privileged students "would spend three years pissing it up in college, knowing full well that Daddy would get them a good job when they left no matter what",[4] "while ordinary kids have nothing to look forward to".[5] Linton Kwesi Johnson's "Me Wan' Fi Go Rave" was taken as a musical starting point and keyboardist Jerry Dammers added a plucked piano intro inspired by John Barry (possibly from "A Man Alone" from the soundtrack to the film The Ipcress File).[4][6]
Reception
Reviewing the song for Record Mirror, Daniela Soave wrote "The group with the Midas touch and my most favourite of the 2 Tone movement. Needless to say they've come up with another winner although this one isn't as obvious as their previous offerings. It sports a fine mysterious keyboard refrain at the beginning which keeps popping up through the song, rather like a Dashiel Hammit novel would make you feel. The more I listen to it the more I love It. The best since 'Gangsters'.[7]
Music video
The music video was shot in the main hall of the Lanchester Polytechnic, now Coventry University, where Dammers and Horace Panter had studied. The band dressed up as stereotypical teachers: Lynval Golding in a tracksuit, Neville Staple in a gown and with a mortarboard, Roddy Radiation as an art teacher, Terry Hall wearing a bow tie and glasses, John Bradbury as a science teacher, Panter in a "tweed jacket with leather elbow patches", and Dammers as the "headmistress from hell." The video was banned by the BBC because of Dammers' cross-dressing.[4]