Jerry Dammers is the founder, main songwriter and keyboard player of the legendary Coventry ska band The Specials, and the founder of the 2 Tone record label. In the late seventies and early eighties, The Specials/Special AKA had many “hits with a message”, including the haunting Ghost Town and the anti-Apartheid anthem Free Nelson Mandela.

Jerry went on to organise Artists Against Apartheid UK concerts including the free concert on Clapham Common drawing a quarter of a million people and leading directly to the Mandela Wembley Stadium concerts broadcast to millions around the world. In 2014 Jerry received one of South Africa’s highest awards ‘The Companions of O. R. Tambo Award’ for his campaigning work against Apartheid.

Jerry will be playing mainly vinyl records. He started DJ ing at the Wag Club with Paul Weller at a benefit for the miners’ strike in 1984, and has carried on ever since, building up a reputation as a deejay, nowadays playing mainly club sets of revival reggae and ska, sometimes with funk and rhythm and blues thrown in.”