UB40 bringing the cool to the Palms pool

If UB40 has proven anything over the past 45 years, it is that it’s a chill band. Even at 115 degrees on a Vegas pool deck.

“The heat obviously, in our elderly years, is something we need to be careful of,” band co-founder Earl Falconer says in Zoom chat, alongside longtime bandmate Robin Campbell. “But it is all part of being a musician, sweating and playing. I love it, personally. I’m looking forward to it.”

UB40 is playing Palms’ SOAK pool at 9 p.m. (doors at 7 p.m.) Saturday. Junior Marvin & The Legendary Wailers and Big Mountain open in this reggae celebration. The show is for ages 21-over; go to www.palms.com for intel.

“Outdoor gigs are generally easier to do than indoor gigs, because you’ve got the fresh air outdoors,” Campbell says. “Outdoor gigs are a lot more fun.”

We will hold them to that. UB40 is still drawing audiences and still making music. “UB45,” their latest album, is due Oct.27.

“I still can’t believe it has been that long,” Campbell says. “Forty-five years is a lifetime. It has gone by too fast.”

Falconer said the band has remained lighthearted . He was actually drinking a glass of red wine during the interview. If that move was to subconsciously refer to the classic, “Red, Red, Wine,” it worked.

“We have not always taken ourselves too seriously, but obviously we took the music seriously,” the vocalist and bassist says. “We wanted to make it a career. There’s nothing better than doing this, as a career, and we’ve managed to sustain it.”

Falconer works the math out loud.

“You look at some bands, they go five, 10 years, and they’re doing very well,” he says. “Ten years is exemplary. Forty-five years is ridiculous.”

Campbell says he always knew he wanted to be a musician. He also new the genre.

“I talked with all of my friends from a very early age about forming a band, and when reggae happened in the 60s, that was it” the guitarist/vocalist says. “For me, there was never any other kind of music that we wanted to play. That was what we heard everywhere we went where we lived.”

The band originated from Birmingham, England.

“The area that we lived in had a high Jamaican population,” Campbell says. “We heard Jamaican pop music everywhere we went. So when we formed a band, it was only ever going to be a reggae band.”

Producing the unique reggae/pop sound, UB40 has charted 50 hit singles in the U.K., including the top-selling “Red Red Wine” and “(I Can’t Help) Falling in Love With You.” The band’s U.S. Top 10 have been “Here I Am (Come and Take Me)” and “The Way You Do The Things You Do.”

The songs are catchy. Younger fans have found the old hits on YouTube and Spotify.

“It’s a bit of a shocker, we get like young kids, obviously people our age and a little bit older,” Falconer says. “But I mean, we have that third generation of kids who grew up, their parents loved us and they’ve been indoctrinated by their parents and grandparents. It’s really surprising.”

Campbell says the band has picked up fans who were born long after the band was formed. “We get teenagers in the audience, and they know the words, which is even more impressive.”

Falconer says the band reaches across the decades by defying time.

“The way people consume music now, they don’t really care what year it’s from, or what decade it’s from,” the veteran musician says. “They just hear something and they like it. ‘Red Red Wine’ has been popular on TikTok, it blew up a couple of years ago as a mashup.”

“Red Red Wine” is served in a bottomless glass.

“It’s a recurring thing, what we used to call a bootleg back in the day,” Falconer says. “Someone will pick up the song and make brilliant bits out of it, give it another life. We are into that.”

John Katsilometes’ column runs daily in the A section. His “PodKats!” podcast can be found at reviewjournal.com/podcasts. Contact him at jkatsilometes@reviewjournal.com. Follow @johnnykats on Twitter, @JohnnyKats1 on Instagram.