ON the same day as the 2022 World Cup final, England lost one of its most beloved singers – Terry Hall of The Specials.
“Terry passed away right after the game,” recalls his bandmate and best buddy, Lynval Golding. “I was in Jamaica when I got the phone call to tell me he’d gone.”
The late Terry Hall formed The Specials in 1977 and became one of the defining voices of the 2 Tone movement Credit: Redferns
Bandmate Lynval Golding says he was ‘blessed’ to work with Terry, one of England’s greatest lyricists Credit: Getty
On December 18, Lynval had been watching Argentina beat France on penalties after a 3-3 extra-time thriller.
He says: “It was a fantastic game and I thought to myself, ‘Terry, that game was played for you’.”
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While Lynval is a Chelsea fan, Terry supported Man United — but both had been following the Three Lions.
Four years on, as England’s 2026 campaign ends in defeat to Argentina, The Specials have released their final album, recorded in the summer of 2019 in their teenage stomping ground of Coventry.
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Across 24 tracks, it is a reminder of a band that smashed racial and class divides — yet one that did it with horn-fuelled hooks primed for the dance floor.
Live From The Cathedral draws on a four-night homecoming stand in the ruined shell of the old St Michael’s Cathedral, bombed almost to oblivion in the Blitz.
It includes all The Specials’ favourites — Too Much Too Young, Rat Race, Nite Klub, Stereotype and Ghost Town among them.
There’s also room for songs from Encore, the band’s studio album released earlier in 2019, including Vote For Me, B.L.M., and a reworking of Fun Boy Three’s The Lunatics.
The Specials bassist Horace Panter says the band’s final album is ‘the last hurrah, the final full stop’ Credit: Redferns
Singer Terry with Steve, Horace, Nikolaj and Lynval playing at the ruins Coventry Cathedral, 2019 Credit: Getty
It ends with The Specials’ lilting cover of You’re Wondering Now with the Coventry crowd, given encouragement from Terry, chanting the chorus of, “You’re wondering now, what to do/Now you know, this is the end.”
As it has turned out, the album does mark the end of The Specials, the ska revivalists with punk attitude who formed in 1977 and captivated the nation as members of the 2 Tone movement alongside The Beat, Selecter and Madness.
And that’s why I’m speaking to the surviving core members, guitarist and occasional vocalist Lynval, who came to Britain as part of the Windrush generation, and bassist Horace Panter.
I’m supposed to be talking to them together — but then I didn’t take the World Cup into account.
Only when Horace and I are winding up our chat does Lynval join the video call.
“I just woke up. I was watching football all night!” he exclaims.
It’s the day after England beat Mexico and though Lynval lives near Seattle these days, he’s in London staying with family.
He adds: “Obviously every four years, football is the most important thing in our lives. I’ve got my England shirt!”
The Specials at Parson’s Nose chip shop in the Eighties Credit: Getty
The Specials perform live on stage during their 40th Anniversary Tour at Coventry Cathedral ruins on July 09, 2019 Credit: Getty
Lynval is the extrovert who wears his heart firmly on his sleeve while Horace seems to be a calm and thoughtful character.
Hearing from these contrasting souls, one thing becomes abundantly clear. They think it’s all over.
“This live album is the last hurrah, the final full stop,” says Horace.
“Losing Terry was a tragic way for it to end, but it’s been an absolute joy to have been part of this band. Incredible.
“I’ve moved on,” he continues. “Life happens.
“In 2021, I was handed a granddaughter which I wasn’t expecting.
“My son and his wife have moved up to live near us (not far from Warwick), so I’m involved in looking after her.
“I still play music — noisy blues rock with some buddies from Leamington and Coventry.
The Specials captivated the nation as members of the 2 Tone movement alongside The Beat, Selecter and Madness Credit: Getty
Terry died aged 63 on December 18, 2022 after a battle with pancreatic cancer, leaving The Specials and fans devastated Credit: Getty
“I do other musical stuff and I’ve got this art career. I paint pictures.”
As for Lynval, the loss of Terry aged 63 from pancreatic cancer, came as the bitterest of blows. “It took me three years to even listen to those live recordings,” he says. “It felt so raw.”
He sees Live From The Cathedral as a tribute to all those members of the 2 Tone family “who are no longer with us”, including Specials drummer John Bradbury, trombonist Rico Rodriguez and The Beat’s Ranking Roger.
“But it is more focused around Terry than anyone else,” he says.
“I was absolutely blessed to work with him, one of the best lyricists England has ever produced. He never got the credit he deserved — he was so damned good.”
Lynval vividly describes his heartbreak at discovering his close friend was seriously ill.
Terry had just got back from Los Angeles where he’d been writing songs for the next (and never to be released) Specials album and Lynval had flown over from Seattle for sessions.
He says: “The next day, I went to the studio and Nikolaj [Torp Larsen], our musical director, was there.
The Specials in 1980 Credit: Getty
The Specials became one of Britain’s most influential bands, mixing dancefloor anthems with powerful songs about social issues Credit: Alamy
“We listened to some of the music — one song had the feeling of Funky Kingston.
“I waited but Terry didn’t turn up. I was the only one he would let visit him at home in Islington so I got on the Underground, came off at the Angel, and walked right to his house.
“His wife Lindy opened the door. She looked a bit concerned and said, ‘Terry’s in bed’.
“We both had jet lag so I decided to leave him that way. I had my usual cup of mint tea and chatted with Lindy.”
Later that week, Lynval heard that Terry had been to hospital and received devastating test results.
He says: “I went to Coventry and hit a bottle of rum. I went into a black space — completely dark.”
Soon after his pilgrimage to the Midlands city where they had formed The Specials, Lynval rang Terry.
“Terry rarely talked to anyone on the phone but he knew we had something to discuss.
“He said, ‘I’m going to fight this’, and I said, ‘Terry, I’m going to be right by your side, fighting with you brother’.”
Lynval firmly believes he is “spiritually connected” to Terry and, by way of example, explains how he came to sing Moon River at his funeral.
“When Brad [John Bradbury] died in 2015, I sang Redemption Song as a tribute, with just cello, violin and viola.
“Terry’s wife asked me what I was going to do this time. I said, ‘I don’t think I have the strength to do anything’.”
But then, Lynval heard a radio playing Andy Williams’ definitive version of Moon River.
He says: “It was beautiful. I rang Lindy and said, ‘I will sing for Terry and I know what I’m going to do — Moon river, wider than a mile’.
“She started crying and said, ‘It was our wedding song and I played it to him on his deathbed, you’re a genius’, and I hadn’t known.”
So, along with Nikolaj and guitarist Steve Cradock, Lynval performed Moon River in the same crematorium as John Bradbury’s funeral.
He says: “When I sang that line, ‘Two drifters off to see the world’, I thought of Brad and Terry.”
The loss of two such important bandmates prompts Lynval to echo Horace’s sentiments that The Specials have run their course.
He says: “My book is always open, but not to do anything as The Specials ever again.
“I was so blessed to work with these musicians but I can’t play the guitar any more.
“My nerves were damaged after I was hit by a bus.
“I’ve passed my guitars and keyboards on to my 18-year-old great-nephew Jayden. He’s a jazzer and a Golding!”
I ask Horace for his thoughts on Terry and he talks of “a private person despite the fact that he could go out in front of four or five thousand people”.
He adds: “I would kill to go on Desert Island Discs but Terry was like, ‘No, I won’t do that’.
“But there was always something to laugh about with him. He could be very funny. We bonded over Northern working men’s club comedians and Spinal Tap.”
Now it’s time to return to those balmy summer nights in 2019 when Terry, Lynval, Horace, Nikolaj, Steve Cradock and the rest of the ace live Specials band performed those hometown gigs in Coventry.
Horace says: “It was a real coming together of people in Coventry and the ruins of the cathedral was a fantastic venue.
“Usually when we went to Coventry, we would play this big soulless concrete shed up by the football stadium.”
He adds: “I was still living there in 2019 so I would walk over the green to Empress House, catch a No13, which dropped me off at Pool Meadow. Then I’d cross the road, go up through the university, and I was at the cathedral. It was great.”
He remembers Coventry being “a tough place to live” back in the Seventies when The Specials got together, the other members who made the debut album besides Terry, Lynval, Horace and Brad being Jerry Dammers, Neville Staple and Roddy Radiation.
“By the time we came to prominence in 1979, there was an enormous amount of unemployment and disaffection in Coventry,” says Horace.
Although Dammers’ masterpiece Ghost Town could be about any downtrodden city with big social problems, it could, he suggests, also have been about their hometown.
He says: “Lynval suffered racism in some of the jobs he had. At night, he’d go out to the clubs and getting home could be quite an adventure.”
Though The Specials were associated with Rock Against Racism, Horace says: “We didn’t play many of the gigs because we were the working definition of white guys and black guys making music that works. It was unity in action.”
He draws my attention to the great Friday Night, Saturday Morning which The Specials perform on Live From The Cathedral and is dedicated by Terry to the fabled Parson’s Nose fish and chip shop in Coventry.
The song goes: “Hope the chip shop isn’t closed. Cos’ their pies are really nice. I’ll eat in the taxi queue. Standing in someone else’s spew.”
Horace says: “That was one of Terry’s first forays into songwriting and a really important song of ours. He gave it a very droll delivery.
“The Parson’s Nose was the chippy that stayed open late after you’d been to clubs like Mr George’s, La Chaumière or Tiffany’s. You’d go there for a steak and kidney pie and mushy peas.
“Nite Klub mentions Tiffany’s. The shows we did there were the apogee of 2-Toning in 1979.”
Lynval says: “I got chased in Coventry, I got stabbed in Coventry. It could be a running battle because of the racial problem.”
But he adds that he had “wonderful” Friday nights and Saturday mornings that ended up at The Parson’s Nose or the Chinese takeaway next door.
“We were youth, we were growing up and I really did ‘wish I had lipstick on my shirt instead of piss stains on my shoes’.”
Horace maintains that The Specials gave Coventry something to smile about and to be proud of in the late Seventies “and that was acknowledged during the gigs in 2019”.
So, I can’t help but ask, how did Horace get his stage name, Sir Horace Gentleman?
“That was Lynval’s fault,” he replies. “I was raised in Kettering, Northamptonshire, and had a very plummy accent.
“I was at art college and wasn’t working class by any stretch. And, of course, lots of people had reggae names like Prince Buster or Sir Coxsone.”
Horace says The Specials “owed as much a debt of gratitude to The Clash as we did to the Jamaican artists.
“We had the great good fortune to open for The Clash for three weeks in 1978 so we could sit side-stage every night and watch how those guys delivered and what they delivered.
“We thought, ‘Well, OK, if we’re going to be any good, we’ve got to be at least as good as these guys’. The Clash set the benchmark.”
But the final words are with Lynval, who has nothing but fond memories of his time in a very special band.
“I feel so honoured to have been in The Specials,” he says.
“It’s nearly 50 years since we first got together. What an achievement!
“And, hold on a minute, those songs are just as relevant today.”
Lynval leaves us with a quote from a song that Horace insisted they play live at every show because it served as a mission statement.
“Just because you’re a black boy. Just because you’re a white. It doesn’t mean you’ve got to hate him. It doesn’t mean you’ve got to fight.
“It doesn’t make it alright.”
THE SPECIALS
Live From The Cathedral
★★★★☆
The Specials Live From The Cathedral is out now Credit: Supplied
