by Aidin Vaziri
(August '93, unpublished)

The Skeletones aren't lost in time, they're merely making their own. In a world laden with b-boy megalomania and harmless electronic undertakings, theirs is a sound which embodies all the savvy of early '80s legends who embraced "Mission Impossible" chic, motored around on Italian scooters and had a flair for kicking out a strapping English bastardization of Caribbean laced funkheavy emphasis on horns, rhythms and peppery riffswith cool names like The Specials, The Beat and The Selecter. You can call the genre Ska, but it wouldn't be an entirely fair take on The Skeletones' verve.

"People tend to label the word Ska as something that's never going to go anywhere," insists Jonas Cabrera, the band's magnetic lead singer and trumpeter . "On the contrary, I don't think our music is boring at all. It's totally 100 percent exciting to me. And I only say that because every show we've ever played, I have not seen one where no one was dancing. And we've played a lot of shows, for years and years."

Nearly a decade's worth to be exact. And in that time, The Skeletones have managed to not only propel, but also redefine a scene which seemed doomed to spending its final breaths in run down pizza joints in the shadow of a dwindling cult following.

Flash forward to 1993 and find those Ska roots as vibrant as ever via a bastion of fragmented scenes and an upsurge of commercial attention due in large part to The Skeletones' relentless touring and creative marketing skills.

On the evidence of their self-titled independent CD release [on their own MJC label], The Skeletones' end of the century variation on the old school Ska flavor signifies a movement on its way to major mainstream outbreak. Without the retro umbilical, the Southern California outfit branches into modern day territory unflinchingly. While straightforward Rude Boy cuts like "Nutty Day" and "The Telephone" give nods to the band's Two-Tone roots, the jazz-inflicted "Jill Victoria" and the smooth soul flourish of "My Love" nourish The Skeletones' growth. To further detach themselves from the stigma of Ska's lean years, the band rejoices with the lyric "This one's for the new generation!," on the topical "Let's Move On" and inflicts some post-grunge seasoning on the album's opener, "She Just Wants Too!"

It's this haphazard meeting of styles that has made The Skeletones such an endeared commodity. With airplay on over 200 commercial and college stations throughout the US and Canada, distribution deals with seven major agents and an 18-week continental tour of North America in the works, the band is well on its way to becoming a bona fide success story. And an unusual one at that. Joining Cabrera in the endeavor are keyboardist Paul Hampton, guitarist Alex Tasch, bassist Mark Cummings, drummer Jason Schultz, trombone player Garth Schultz, saxophone player Kip Wirtzfeld and lead trumpeter Mike Espinoza, The Skeletones coterie.

"Our music right now, as far as 1993 is going on, I see a lot of grunge, I see a lot of hippie stuff going on, and I don't see any kind of Skeletones genre anywhere," Cabrera says. "So it's bound to hit. It'll be really appealing to a lot of people really soon, as soon as they find out about it. We're just pretty much trying to go all the way with what we want, the way we want it."

"Man, people come to our shows that have long hair, bald hair, whatever and they get off," Hampton says.

Cabrera agrees. "I think the reason we're so successful with our shows is because there are no hang ups. As soon as we go on-stage, we just go for it. We don't worry about shit. We just have a good time. People just get off. I just love the music. I've always loved the Ska music, and then when I joined the Skeletones that was my chance to become a member of an organization and luckily it turned into a great venture, because most bands don't last. There's just too many bands. I just think with all the shit they're laying out on the radio and stuff that they're releasing, we gotta get big. There's just no way. Something has to happen positive. I don't see anything going anywhere else but forward for us."

At a recent show staged by the influential alternative West Coast radio station KROQ at Los Angeles' revered Whiskey Au Go Go, hundreds of fans converged to watch The Skeletones pummel through another one of their legendary live sets. Fueled by the groundswell of support they have received as of late, the band decided to return the favor by inviting a hairdresser friend of theirs on stage to give Cabrera a mohawk right in the middle of their set, much to the surprise of the show's sponsors and delight of the fan's. After the new coiffure was touched up, the 20 year old singer leapt into the audience to mosh it up with the locals. A very un-Ska thing to do.

"We already have proven that the album can go so many ways, because there's been a couple times we've called radio stations where they go, Oh yeah, we got The Skeletones, it's in the rock section.' Or, Oh yeah, man, we're playing it on the Reggae show.' It just all depends on the people out there. Some people think we're a Ska band, some people are going to read this and say, They're not a Ska band."

"Okay, here's the solution to the whole problem, we've got to redefine Ska," Hampton decides, "to Skeletones Kick Ass."

Bill Tanner (ska@billtanner.net)