The Trojans

By adding bagpipes and fiddles to reggae rhythms Gaz Mayall and The Trojans created one of music's most bizarre sub-genres - "Celtic ska" - and became longstanding cult heroes of London's music scene. The son of legendary blues guitarist John Mayall, Gaz originally formed the band in 1986 to play at his Soho club night Gaz's Rockin' Blues, and three decades later both the club and the group are still going strong. A music obsessive with over 10,000 records in his collection, he and the band were at the centre of a ska revival and their vibrant, jumping culture clash of sound gained a large following in Japan thanks to albums Spirit Of Adventure (1988), Wild And Free (1992) and Cool Rulers (1996). Regular performers at Glastonbury Festival and the Notting Hill Carnival, they briefly featured Zoe Devlin as lead singer before leaving to appear on The X Factor in 2013. Hollie Cook, daughter of Sex Pistols drummer Paul Cook, replaced her as lead vocalist.

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