by Michael Terrazas

Don't call it a trend.

Surfing the airwaves of modern rock, one is nearly as likely today to stumble upon the blaring horns and two-tone rhythms of ska music as the grinding guitars of grunge, but it ain't new, folks -- the Mighty Mighty BossTones were ska when ska wasn't cool.

Hailing from the town in Massachusetts that's simply a different pronunciation of their name, the BossTones have been whipping crowds into pogo-stick frenzies for more than a decade now, only recently drawing to their records the kind of attention their live shows have so long enjoyed. With eight bandmembers, each bringing his own range of influences, the BossTones' sound defies easy classification, but hyperkinetic ska is the trademark of the band, has been for quite a while. And while lead vocalist Dicky Barrett has no beef with the recent rash of bands cashing in on his passion, his wince is almost audible when he hears "ska" and "trend" in the same sentence.

"I don't pay a whole lot of attention to trends," he sighs over the phone from Minneapolis, where the band is playing on the Warped Tour. "If bands that deserve attention get that attention because of anything we've done, that's great. But we're concentrating on being the BossTones."

His whiskey-and-cigarettes voice quiet and reserved, Barrett sounds like a man tired of doing interviews, but he better get used to it. With the success of Let's Face It, the band's fifth album and third on Mercury Records, the Mighty Mighty Bosstones -- Barrett, guitarist Nate Albert, trombone player Dennis Brockenborough, "Bosstone" Ben Carr, saxophone players Kevin Lenear and Tim Burton, bassist Joe Gittleman and drummer Joe Sirois -- are getting mighty mighty airplay, and that translates into more press... and more shows.

It's a Plaid, Plaid, Plaid, Plaid World

Though the bandmembers don't sport it quite so often on stage anymore, plaid still has its own prayer altar in the temple of the BossTones. "It's completely in our hearts," he says. "We considered our music to be plaid, probably still is." When asked how, he replies, "I dunno, obnoxious? Loud? Colorful?"

All those and much more. Like a kilt, the band's sound is a multicolored splash of ska, punk, metal and other influences that blend together in a mixture so energetic and upbeat it's no wonder a BossTones crowd in Rochester, N.Y., actually caved in the floor of what used to be the Horizontal Boogie Bar. Barrett recalls the band had just finished a song when he looked out and noticed that everyone in the middle of the room seemed to be about two feet shorter.

Pumped up fans still buzzing from a property-destruction high ripped up planks from the sunken floor for bandmembers to autograph, and a few short days later the BossTones returned to make up the show in the newly repaired club.

If there's one thing that's most refreshing about the BossTones, it's the devotion to giving their fans a good show. Barrett, for one, considers himself an entertainer first and musician second, which explains his pinball-like stage presence. And what other band would still don its characteristic three-button suits and wingtips for an MTV beach show out in the Florida heat? "They were summer suits," Barrett offers.

"None of our tours are backbreaking, mindbending work," Barrett says, keeping things in perspective. He is a self-confessed fan of "show business schtick and that kind of schmaltzy crap," and the Bosstones figure that as long as the fans pay good money to come and see them play, they ought to get a night's entertainment out of it.

Indeed, sometimes they get more than that. At another show in Lowell, Mass., Barrett noticed a bouncer getting a little too rough with an excited fan -- he was strangling him, in fact -- and decided to intervene. "The bouncer was an idiot. I ran over and grabbed his shirt, and he spun around and looked at me in horror. He couldn't believe anyone was even entering his world, and he let go of the kid." For his trouble, Barrett was arrested and had to appear in court a month later. But no doubt that bouncer will think twice before cutting off future moshers' windpipes.

Perhaps in recognition of the BossTones' willingness to don the occasional pair of handcuffs for them, some fans have even begun to follow the band from city to city, probably setting up vending tables of Murray's hair grease and shoe polish outside the clubs. But lest we evil media label these wandering souls "Toneheads" or "BossToners," Barrett says "the thing I like best about them is they haven't given themselves a cute name, and I don't want to do that."

In addition to a retinue of groupies, the band's recent increase in exposure has led to opportunities, some noble, some just too weird to pass up. Of the latter, listen to the Mighty Mighty BossTones tearing through "Detroit Rock City" on KISS My Ass, the KISS tribute album. Or watch them performing for Alicia Silverstone in Clueless, a gig Barrett seems to regret only for the fact that people keep bringing it up. So is Alicia a regular in the BossTones' crowds these days, dressed like Batgirl and battling supervillian Gene Simmons? Nope, Barrett chuckles. "She's not welcome."

On the more philanthropic side, last year the BossTones' own label, Big Rig Records, released Safe and Sound: A Benefit In Response to the Brookline Clinic Violence, prompted by the December 1994 murders of two young women at Boston-area family-planning clinics. Morphine, Lou Barlow, Tracy Bonham and others all helped out on the record. The band also has a long-term association with the Anti Racist Action Group.

"It's stuff we all feel strongly about, [but] we don't try to bring a lot of attention to ourselves," Barrett says of the causes the Bosstones support. "We get in there and get out."

And even though the band enjoys the reputation of just being a kick-ass good time to see, the songs more often than not have serious ideas in mind. On "Another Drinkin' Song," Barrett sings "What I've counted on to pick me up has knocked me to my knees, before I hit the floor once more I'll call it the disease." And from Let's Face It's title track: "Why were we put here? What for? We sure weren't put here to hate. Why so cut and dry? A simple concept missed, give tolerance a try."

Still, Barrett says, "none of the stuff we say really beats anyone over the head with a hammer," and certainly none of it gets in the way of violently churning live shows where the only rule is not to hurt anyone. Expect nothing less Aug. 5, when The Mighty Mighty BossTones bring their controlled chaos to Lakewood Amphitheatre for the Atlanta stop of the Warped Tour, along with Social Distortion, Pennywise, Descendents and many more. "I love Atlanta," Barrett says. "We've done really well there, and it's always been fun. Cool town, cool scene."

 

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