Fishbone

The title of Fishbone’s newest collection of itchy ska, skunky funk, slippery rhymes, and full-tilt mayhem is a serious mouthful, for sure, but if ya just turn yer skull a few degrees toward the ozone, gently spread the space between yer ears, and pay attention, it’ll all make perfect sense soon enough …

Spawned by an unruly posse in an L.A. junior high over 20 years ago, Fishbone “started out in the music room playin’ Bootsy and Rick James and Led Zeppelin covers,” according to the group’s hyper-kinetic, elastic-voiced singer Angelo Moore, “and we just stuck together. We’d go over to Wood’s (bassist Norwood Fisher) mom’s house and play in the bedroom, bangin’ on pots and pans and whatever.”

“At first, we’d get together on weekends,” recalls trumpeter/singer Walter “Dirty Walt” Kibby II, “then it turned into every day. It’s the only band I’ve really been in. We had other names before Fishbone. Another name we had — Megatron — would get us gigs with heavy metal bands. So they’d book us with metal bands, and we’d get up there and play ska and funk and stuff, and these longhairs would be saying, ‘What the hell are these guys doin’ here?’”

Fishbone’s eagerness to confront, provoke, and cross-pollinate enabled them (along with the Red Hot Chili Peppers, the Untouchables, et al.) to help the early-’80s L.A./Orange County music scene shake free of the unsavory grip of uninspired hard rock and “new wave” hair-bands.

Since breaking through in 1985 with the frenetic, cross-media smash “Party at Ground Zero” (from their self-titled debut EP), the ‘Boners have continued to delight fans and confound radio programmers with eight more pungent servings (five full-length, three EPs) of their joyful, eclectic noise. Through it all, the band has embraced, lampooned, and shifted hairstyles and clothes like a stripped-gear chameleon — the constants are ENERGY and MOTION.

Ya see, even if some monolithic radio stations haven’t always sussed Fishbone’s straight-talk, quicksilver material and shoot-from-the-hip attack, live audiences around the world have been surrendering to the band’s stage flash and magical riddums with stunning regularity. Such passionate devotion is not lost on Fishbone, who refer to their friends on the road as “the Familyhood.”

“We don’t wanna call them ‘fans’,” explains Wood, “cuz when we’re out touring, it feels like family when they’re takin’ care of us. They might get us some beer, they might bring us their sister, or … anyway, we call it the Familyhood, and this is the Familyhood Nexperience. It’s the next level — it’s experiencing the future right now, ya know?”

Fishbone’s dynamic, charismatic stage presence has garnered them countless plum gigs, among them the main stage on Lollapalooza, TV appearances on “Saturday Night Live,” “Late Night with Conan O’Brien,” “The Larry Sanders Show,” and an MTV special, and, in November 1999, they returned to the International Cannabis Cup in Amsterdam as headliners.

Two decades down the road, core members Angelo, Wood, and Dirty Walt are still together; still tearin’ it up with their inimitable (and virtually indescribable), unhinged stew of rock, punk, soul, funk, ska, word-jazz, and reggae, which they call “nuttmeg.” Over the long, arduous trek through time and space, the band has lost a few musicians for a variety of reasons, but has managed to stay true to its essence.

“Right now,” Angelo says proudly, “Fishbone is going through another period of reincarnation. We’re remaking ourselves like Freddie Krueger, like a phoenix rising from the ashes, ya know? Re-re-rising. It’s that whole blood-transfusion, Frankenstein job, and it always takes a little time to adjust to a new organ. But it’s happening, and we’re ready to go.”

Easing the transition is mondo-guitarist Tracey “Spacey T” Singleton. A former member of “Black Rock” pioneers Sound Barrier and Mother’s Finest, Spacey T can slip deftly from the shredding, freakazoid power of his idols Eddie Hazel and Jimi Hendrix to chopping out crisp, cut-glass rhythms. “I learned about 45 Fishbone songs in, like, two days!” Spacey T remembers. “We played about six of them one day; a couple days later we did six more, and they said, ‘The day after tomorrow, we’re goin’ on the road ‘ So that’s how I got the job — we just played the songs I’d learned and took off.”

“Fishbone & The Familyhood Nexperience Presents …” busts out of the box with the muscular, strutting funk of “Shakey Ground,” a densely layered workout dragged howling out of the same murky swamp that begat Sly & The Family Stone’s landmark “There’s a Riot Goin’ On.” “The Suffering” takes a languid reggae groove and caps it with the kind of slipped-riddum stretches and serpentine vocals which have kept War tunes bleeding out of car stereos for decades of summers.

The staggeringly infectious “Where’d You Get Those Pants?” is a flat-out, stone killer. Riding a skittering drum pattern, greasy bass, percolating guitar, expansive horn charts, and ebullient backing vocals, Angelo croons, chirps, and barks with sassy assurance through the most determined series of come-ons a major league horndog can muster. And so it goes throughout the disc. Informed by (and marinated in) soul, funk, reggae, and ska’s glorious past but firmly rooted in the here and now, Fishbone have completed their most fully realized irreverent romp yet.

The record’s staggering guest-list reflects Fishbone’s storied eclecticism, and is as much a tribute to their heroes as it is an addition to their sound. There are flat-out legends like Blowfly, George Clinton, Rick James, and the Bad Brains’ H.R.; musicians’ musicians like Billy Bass, Lenny Castro, Jeff “Skunk” Baxter, Zappa/Beefheart’s Fowler Brothers, and Charles & Ivan Neville; and a heapin’ helpin’ of multi-tone homeys who’ve shared or crossed the band’s historic path.

Among the latter are Jane’s Addiction’s Perry Farrell; the Chili Peppers’ Flea, John Frusciante, and Chad Smith; No Doubt’s Gwen Stefani; and Bronx Style Bob. Donny Osmond is along (Angelo — “He’s in there groovin’ with the rest of ’em, man. Donny’s got it goin’ on — the guy’s got a good heart.”) because this IS Fishbone, after all.

Apart from their own internal diversity, the members of Fishbone keep their creative juices bubbling with such side projects as Angelo’s poetry and solo spoken-word tours, the group’s whacked-out, ever-expanding soul/funk “tribute” band, Trulio Disgracias, and group/solo cameo appearances in (and/or tracks for) such films as “I’m Gonna Get You Sucka,” “Back to the Beach,” “Tapeheads,” “The Mask,” “Dead Man Walking,” “Good Burger,” and “Play It to the Bone.” The band will be providing a song or two for Disney’s upcoming animated sequel to “The Jungle Book,” with voice characterizations possible.

“It’s satisfying to still be here,” Wood sums up, “cuz there were a lot of great bands out there at the time that we came up, and now most of them don’t even exist. The main thing is that we plan on being here forever.” The secret, according to Angelo, is simple, “Keep on grinnin’, and hope for the best….”