A trend-setting band’s (another) collection

Like contemporaries The Red Hot Chili Peppers, Fishbone are still going strong almost 20 years after releasing their debut material. Along with the Chilis and The Untouchables, Fishbone are products of the Californian punk crossover scene of the mid to late 1980s. The band is also cited as one of the first commercially successful black ‘rock’ acts!

The reason for this mélange of ska, funk, punk, metal, rock was the result of the residents of South Central Los Angeles, the NWA’s place of origin and LA’s rap-epicentre, being bussed to the San Fernando Valley for junior high schooling Dropped into foreign territory, the Fisher bros (John ‘Norwood’, bass/vox and Philip Dwight ‘Fish’, drums), Kendall Rey Jones (gtr), Christopher Gordon Dowd (trombone, keys) and Walter Adam Kibby (trumpet) bonded together with the local Angelo Moore (sax/voc.) and expressed the tension of integration through music.

Combining homeboy and Valley boy tastes – citing Parliament Funkadelic and Rush as equal influences – the band confronted and subjugated racial barriers. They essentially applied a brass section to Heavy Metal by drawing heavily on ska and soul as well as alternative rock. The result was five full-length albums, various EPs and a number of ‘Greatest Hits’ collections. All justified as they provide a missing link between George Clinton’s Funkadelic lot and Jane’s Addiction.

One of the band’s early songs was the ominously titled track ‘Party At Ground Zero’. The band’s oeuvre is a fierce hardcore music on which the band flexes its credentials as both able social commentators and party animals. Still, the fans adore Fishbone for their vibrant live show that can’t fail to move even the most casual observer.

The band’s career has had some interesting detours, such as backing Little Richard on ‘Rock Island Line’, a track on the Woody Guthrie and Leadbelly tribute record, ‘Folkways: A Vision Shared’ (1988); then, they backed Annette Funicello singing the Sixties hit ‘Jamaican Ska’ in the film ‘Back to The Beach’.

The band was on the brink of biggest breakthrough playing the main stage of Lollapalooza ’93 when ‘Norwood’ Fisher was arrested with four others for trying to kidnap ex-guitarist Jones off a California street, a month after quitting the band. Fisher said he was trying to take Jones to psychiatric experts because he had accused Fishbone of being a “demonic” outfit but Jones told the police he had left over “philosophical differences”. Fisher was later acquitted but it had kept the band off the road for about nine months.

‘The Best Of Fishbone’ is a good example of their power, pioneering spirit and innovation but, musically, they are now more interesting for their contribution to rock history rather than for their current output.

8/10