Coming on the back of punk and radical new wavers like Tom Robinson and The Ruts, and taking its roots from Caribbean Ska, Rock Steady and Reggae, the 2-Tone sound was honed into a modern urban multi-racial sound by bands such as The Specials and The Selecter. The Specials' 2-Tone record label gave the movement its name and gave a home to many of the groups of the time. For a new indie lable, 2-Tone was remarkably successful: The Specials themselves notched up classic number one singles like Too Much Too Young and Ghost Town, the latter sounding eerily prophetic against a backdrop of a Britain beset by unemployment, racial tension and largescale rioting … Other 2-Tone bands such as The Beat and The Selecter enjoyed strings of chart hits with instantly memorable and infectious 45s and other groups born out of the same scene, such as Madness and UB40, defined their own distinctive appeal and forged their early success. 

Wheels Out of Gear is also a vivid portrait of Margaret Thatcher's Britain at the turn of the decade, when the National Front and the Anti Nazi League regularly fought pitch battles in the streets, suspects where regularly injured in police custody, Blair Peach was died at the hands of Special Patrol Group police officers and rioters set light to the urban ghettos of Brixton, Toxteth and Handsworth. An era when the 2-Tone Sound - good time music with often darkly political lyrics - created the double-edged musical backdrop to cities that were truly becoming Ghost Towns and a world that appeared to be in flame.