TRANSCRIPT Bullseye with Jesse Thorn: Fishbone’s Angelo Moore & Chris Dowd

[00:00:00]

Transition: Gentle, trilling music with a steady drumbeat plays under the dialogue.

Promo: Bullseye with Jesse Thorn is a production of MaximumFun.org and is distributed by NPR.

Music: “Huddle Formation” from the album Thunder, Lightning, Strike by The Go! Team—a fast, upbeat, peppy song. Music plays as Jesse speaks, then fades out.

Jesse Thorn: It’s Bullseye. I’m Jesse Thorn.

Ska! You know ska, right? We’ve talked about it before on the show. Horns, guitars that play on the offbeat, a guy yelling, “Pick it up!” The Specials, Madness, Reel Big Fish, of course.

 

Music: “241” from the album Skacoustic by Reel Big Fish—a high-tempo, brassy number.

(Music fades out.)

 

Jesse Thorn: And punk? Yeah, you bet. We just talked about punk last week with the Canadian band PUP. There are plenty of ska punk bands. Mustard Plug, Less Than Jake, Op Ivy.

 

Music: “Smiling” from the album Operation Ivy by Operation Ivy.

Smiling!

Friends!

Watching you!

At the party, at the bus stop, at the bar

(Music fades out.)

 

Jesse Thorn: And there’s funk, another genre that we talk about all the time here on Bullseye. One of my favorites—maybe my favorite! Parliament. Sly Stone. Cool and the Gang.

But when it comes to bands that play ska, punk, and funk all at the same time? Well, now we’re kind of zooming in. That’s not a long list, and there are fewer still successful and beloved bands that combine those three genres. And with that in mind, I present to you today’s guests: Angelo Moore and Christopher Dowd, founding members of Fishbone. Easily the biggest ska/funk/punk band in world history. Fishbone formed in 1979, over 45 years ago. Angelo and Chris and the rest of the band were going to school at El Camino Real High in the valley.

They bonded over a love of music from all genres. They were also sort of the Black kids. They became buddies in part because Angelo lived nearby in the valley, and everyone else was bused in from almost 30 miles away. Fishbone’s a beloved band in Los Angeles and beyond. If you’ve never seen them, you absolutely should. It is one of the most incredible spectacles you will ever witness. And I mean that even now in 2025. It’s the psychedelic madness of Funkadelic combined with the hardcore intensity of Black Flag. Earlier this month, the band released their eighth full-length album, Stockholm Syndrome. This song features George Clinton!

It’s called “Last Call in America”.

 

Music: “Last Call in America” from the album Stockholm Syndrome by Fishbone.

Hatred has consumed the nation

Price gauging and rising inflation

5 dollars for gasoline

This drinking water is killing me

(Music fades out.)

 

Jesse Thorn: Angelo, Chris, welcome to Bullseye. I’m so happy to have you on the show. It’s nice to meet you.

(They thank him.)

Can each of you—maybe starting with you, Angelo—tell me a little bit about how you started playing music. Was it school or church or something? At home?

Angelo Moore: It was in school. It was in junior high school, and everybody was in the same music class. Mr. Robbins, right? Yeah. Mr. Robbins in Hale junior high.

Chris Dowd: I got thrown out.

(They laugh.)

Jesse Thorn: Oh, hold that for a second, Chris. Angelo, go ahead.

Angelo Moore: So, yeah, that’s where it started.

Jesse Thorn: What were you playing?

Angelo Moore: Saxophone. And I wanted to play synthesizer in the beginning, but my dad was like, “Well, screw that man. You need to just play this saxophone and stop fooling around.”

Jesse Thorn: Your dad had been a saxophone player, right?

Angelo Moore: Yeah. He played tenor sax and played with Count Basie off and on throughout his life. Mm-hm. And so, that’s where I started out.

Did that make you want to play saxophone and play music or not want to because your dad had done it?

Angelo Moore: Well, I don’t really think it had anything to do with my dad directly. Well, of course it did, because he was like, “Here, you need to play this.”

(Jesse agrees with a laugh.)

Angelo Moore: And I was like, “Okay.”

Jesse Thorn: It had something to do with him, Angelo. I’m not buying that it’s—

Angelo Moore: Yeah. Oh yeah. So, I just said, “Well, I’m playing saxophone.” And that was the instrument assigned to me. I really didn’t have no resistance or nothing like that. It was just like, “Well, this is what I’m doing now.” You know?

Jesse Thorn: What about you, Chris? You got kicked out of music class?

Chris Dowd: Well. Moved to Los Angeles from Vegas when I was about six.

[00:05:00]

And I was always—like, the first thing that happened is I remember being a little kid and dancing in my living room to James Brown with my grandfather. And my dad was a huge Donny Hathaway fan. So, those records were around. And the first music I remember discovering like a lot of was Jackson 5. And they had a cartoon. So, it’s like you’re double hooked. And then we moved to Los Angeles when my parents separated. And I had an uncle who was a Vietnam vet. And he got a piano. Now I always wanted to play guitar. I thought, you know, “I wanna be Tito or some variation to that.” (Laughs.) And, um—

Jesse Thorn: I think everyone saw the Jackson 5 and wanted to be Tito.

(They laugh.)

Chris Dowd: Yeah, yeah. Right. Everybody wanted to be (unclear). Facts.

Jesse Thorn: “My dream is to be Tito,” they said. (Chuckles.)

Chris Dowd: You know what I mean?

Jesse Thorn: Sorry Michael or Jermaine or—

Chris Dowd: Yeah, exactly. Well, seeing Michael play guitar like Tito.

Jesse Thorn: There you go.

Chris Dowd: He would just, you know, play— He left breadcrumbs, my uncle. And he would just play stuff that I liked. And then he’d throw in Miles Davis, and he’d play stuff that I liked. And then he’d throw in like Stevie, then he’d play stuff that I like. And that’s kind of how it all sort of came to pass. So, by the time Angelo and I met each other in junior high school, I’d been playing piano, but it was really all by ear. So, the reason why I got thrown around the music class (chuckles) is because three years into music class, we got that instructor who realized—

Angelo Moore: Mr. Robbins?

Chris Dowd: Yeah, that I did not know how to read music. I was playing everything by ear. They would play it once. I would memorize it, and then I would play the whole piece back. And he was like, “You’ve been here this whole time, and you’re disrupting my class, and you can’t even read music!?”

(They laugh.)

I’m like, “(Chuckles.) Yeah.” Shoulder shrug. And that was it. And I was like, “Fine. ‘Cause I can already play trombone. I never wanted to play this anyways.”

(Angelo laughs.)

I wanted to be cool like Miles Davis and play trumpet. So. You know? ‘Cause that was—my uncle loved miles. You know, he would tell all these stories about going to see Miles play. And there used to be a nightclub at the top of La Brea called Marty’s on the Hill. He’s like, “You could always tell when Miles was there, because his Ferrari would be parked in the red.”

(They chuckle.)

You know? And so, yeah. That was kind of my entree to music.

 

Music: “Hellhounds On My Trail” from the album Stockholm Syndrome by Fishbone.

I got them hellhounds on my trail

These racist politicians trying to keep us locked in jail

Cause I sold a few trees

Back in the day

They wanna throw away the key and keep us locked away

Don’t look now

Can’t you tell

I got them hellhounds on my trail

(Music fades out.)

 

Jesse Thorn: Did you have to play corny music in school?

Angelo Moore: Oh yeah. Oh yeah, dude! That’s probably one of the reasons why I stopped! (Laughs.) When I got to El Camino High School, and I was in the marching band, and—

Chris Dowd: But you were already— Like, Angelo was already like really playing sax by the time he showed up. And you know, we would go hang out at his house after school when we realized he was the only kid that lived out in the valley.

Jesse Thorn: ‘Cause part of the origin of Fishbone is that Angelo lived in the Valley—

Angelo Moore:

Jesse Thorn: —where a lot of other members of the band went to school, because they lived in LA, but were bussed up to the valley for school. Right?

Angelo Moore: In the city bus program. Right. Yeah.

(Chris confirms.)

But what I wanted to say was, yeah, we was playing corny music, but ever since I— I would always look at Locke high. Locke high marching band. And I’m like, “Man, how come my school ain’t doing it like that? Like Locke high?” I wanted to swing and turn the instruments and do all kind of—’cause I was pop-locking too, man. So, I was wanting to do all of that, and I kept trying to like throw it at the teacher or whatever.

They’re like, “Oh yeah, whatever. Get out here.” They had us glide-stepping. Standing up straight, glide-stepping.

We wasn’t dipping. I was like, “Come on, y’all! Let’s do some dip!”

You know? It was like, “Angelo, just be quiet, man. Just follow directions and do this.”

I was like, “Oh, god.”

So, after that, I guess—you know, whatever corny music we was playing, I kept imagining it with like some kind of dip or whip, ’cause it was all homogenized.

[00:10:00]

Jesse Thorn: They were— In other words, they were sending you to the USC marching band, and you were hoping to go to the FAMU marching band.

Chris Dowd: Or Grambling.

Angelo Moore: Yeah, something funky, man! You know? (Chuckles.) So, after that, that’s where my head stayed.

 

Music: “Ma and Pa” from the album Heart and Soul by Fishbone.

Ow!

There once was a Ma that wanted her

There once was a Pa that wanted her

I know she’s confused, she’s my blood sister

Told me the blues as she start to shiver

Only a child in the middle of a war

She’s a problem child now because of a divorce

 

Hey, Ma and Pa

What the hell is wrong with y’all?

Hey, Ma and Pa

(Music fades out.)

 

Jesse Thorn: We’ve got so much more to get into with Angelo and Chris of Fishbone. Stay with us. It’s Bullseye from MaximumFun.org and NPR.

Transition: Thumpy synth with a syncopated beat.

Jesse Thorn: Welcome back to Bullseye. I’m Jesse Thorn. I’m talking with Angelo Moore and Christopher Dowd. They’re founding members of the band Fishbone who’ve been fusing ska, funk, and punk since 1979. The band just released their eighth album earlier this summer. It’s called Stockholm Syndrome. Let’s get back into our conversation.

I watched this documentary about the band. And there’s this moment that I really loved, which is—Angelo, you’re being interviewed by yourself, and you’re describing meeting the other guys from the band in middle school when you all met.

(Angelo confirms.)

And Angelo, you basically just say—I’m paraphrasing here—but you’re like, “I saw some other Black guys, so I was pretty pumped.”

(They laugh.)

Angelo Moore: Yeah, that’s pretty much what it was. I’m like, “And they’re talking to me too!” (Laughs.) So, that’s why I would end up riding the bus two and a half hours from the Valley into LA and two and a half hours back at night just to be with the guys in Fishbone and rehearse. If Mama Fishes (unclear).

Chris Dowd: I also like to pop-lock on that corner of Hollywood and Vine. And that was the other reason why you like to come to Los Angeles. Generally speaking, you would be in Hollywood.

Angelo Moore: Yep, I’d be in Holly. That was the whole—my transfer point. And so, going through Hollywood, I’d do the street dancing thing.

Jesse Thorn: Were you making money doing it, or—?

Angelo Moore: No, I was just doing it because I liked it, man. And then later on, I would just start to discover all of the punk rock clubs in Hollywood—punk rock in Hollywood. And this was all coming from Fishbone rehearsal through Hollywood and back into the Valley. And so, I would just end up staying in Hollywood and just getting into all of that.

Jesse Thorn: (Laughing.) The—I wish I could convey through people’s radio speakers the delight in your eyes at like the stops you were making as an adolescent.

(They agree with chuckles.)

Angelo Moore: You get out to the valley. You get called a (censor beep) on the way home from the bus stop. And sometimes that (censor beep) would happen, sometimes some redneck dude and a truck would me that, and I ended up getting chased into the Vons, the grocery store right over there on Valley Circle and Mulholland, off the 101. And so, that was that whole dynamic.

Jesse Thorn: What about punk rock? How did you find that?

Angelo Moore: Well, that’s when I started to hate White people.

Jesse Thorn: When you got into punk rock? (Chuckles.)

(Angelo confirms and they laugh.)

Tell me more.

Angelo Moore: Because they were chasing me. I’m not gonna say they, but every once in a while I would experience the racism in the Valley. Right? I would just—you know, it was just a part of the mix.

Chris Dowd: Which is kind of how we became friends. Because you would be like, “Hey, why don’t you guys come with me when I have to walk home from the bus stop? Some of y’all need to come back.” And we’d up staying— I’d end up staying at his house and stuff like that. (Laughs.) And I guess the yelling and the cursing out and the calling you the N word on the walk home changed. Because, you know, you had legitimate Hood security.

Angelo Moore: Sometimes I had—yeah. Hood security. (Cackles.)

Chris Dowd: Working in your favor.

Jesse Thorn: You were rolling with the fruit of South LA.

Chris Dowd: And I was just trying to be like, “I think I wanna live where you live! There seems to be a lot less, uh, gun play.”

Jesse Thorn: The question I was asking was how did you come upon punk rock?

Chris Dowd: I will say that, you know, it was in the ether, right?

[00:15:00]

And sort of our backgrounds—and especially like families coming from the South can sort of deeply religious. And all that stuff was sort of like, you know—

Angelo Moore: “Those people are devil worshipers and blah, blah, blah! Devil music!”

Chris Dowd: “Ma, I was just—”

“Devil music!”

And we’d be like, “Okay.”

But you know, some of that is you’re a young kid, and you’re impressionable, and you go to church with your family every Sunday, and these kind of things. And you’re like, “Oh god, am I—?” You know, there’s a duality happening.

And the thing that sort of remedied that sort of balance was like Prince came along. And Rick James came along. And Parliament Funkadelic came along. But to me, like the pivotal record was the first Bad Brains.

 

Music: “Banned in D.C.” from the album Bad Brains by Bad Brains.

Banned in D.C. with a thousand more places to go

Gonna swim across the Atlantic

‘Cause that’s the only place I can go

(Music fades out.)

 

Chris Dowd: Unequivocally, hands down, that was the entire game changer. It was that record—

Angelo Moore: “Banned in D.C.”.

Chris Dowd: And it was the Specials.

 

Music: “Gangsters” by the Specials.

Why must you record my phone calls?

(Music fades out.)

 

Chris Dowd: That record was like, “Well, there’s a Black guy in that band; there’s a White guy in that band. They’re like the biggest band in England. Like, England must be a really cool place!”

(Angelo affirms.)

Because at least racially speaking, they seem to be having some level of communication and sort of—

Angelo Moore: And cohesiveness.

Chris Dowd: —holding each other down. And then I think when you are young, and you’re trying to become a creative, you’re trying to find whatever your identity is. And so, in the quest to trying to find this identity, one of the things that I just think is probably a natural teenage rebellion is just like, “I’m not gonna be what you say I’m supposed to be.” And so, I think socially and intellectually, that idea appealed to us. And so, then we just became a confluence of all these things, and it’s like, (stiffly) “Well, Black people are only supposed to play rhythm and blues!”

My uncle was playing like “Howlin’ Wolf” and Muddy Waters. And that stuff influenced the Stones. But now we’re not supposed to be able to play it? It just felt weird. You know what I mean? Inauthentic and stupid, because—you know, natural rebellion. These were your ideas. This is your idea of what you think society’s supposed to be. And it’s not what our generation is trying to become.

Angelo Moore: Plus, it was all music to me.

(Chris agrees.)

And I’m sure Chris and everybody else felt the same. It was just all music. So, it really didn’t matter what lane the music business was trying to put you in. Like, if you’re Black, you play R&B and funk. If you’re White, you get to rock. If you’re Latino, you play samba. You know, stuff like that. It didn’t matter. It was all good music. It was all feel-good music.

So, we got hit with them lines, and we were still in the age of rebellion— And then plus, for me, dealing with the racism every once in a while, I was really starting to hate White people. And that’s when I got a mohawk. You know. And then I discovered the punk rock like the Bad Brains—their first tape, “Banned in D.C.” And I’m listening to it, and I’m like, “Man, these White boys are killing it, man! Like, what!?” And then I looked at the cover, and I’m like, “These dudes look like some right reggae dudes. Are you sure this is the right picture in here?”

(Chris laughs.)

You know? And so, that’s what confirmed it for me—that it is okay to be black and play kind of music and everything else. ‘Cause these dudes are doing it unapologetically.

Jesse Thorn: Even a lot of those ska bands like the Specials were like wearing matching outfits and like—you know—moving back and forth with their trombone, doing trombone choreography.

Chris Dowd: Rude Boy attire. Definitely

Jesse Thorn: Yeah, exactly.

Angelo Moore: Plus, it kind of matches my— Because I was a Jehovah Witness at the time, going door to door. So, I was just—automatically, I was wearing a suit and tie or a bow tie just on the regular.

[00:20:00]

So, it automatically was like, “Oh, that’s kind of how I dress!” But it’s a little more, you know—the shark skin suits and stuff like that and all that, and the hats, and everything. I’m like, “Oh, that need to be me!”

Chris Dowd: Oh yeah. You started off with Men’s Warehouse.

(They start laughing.)

But by the time—(laughs). What was it then? Brooks Brothers? When I met you, you were straight up Brooks Brothers.

Angelo Moore: Now, what’s the Brooks Brothers?

Chris Dowd: What you were wearing.

(Angelo affirms with a laugh.)

But by the time you started going door to door then, we were starting to wear all the shark skin suits. And your hair was—you had a mohawk, and your mom would make you go anyway.

Angelo Moore: Yuuup!

Jesse Thorn: Chris, you’re sitting in front of me in a Fishbone t-shirt. Angelo is sitting in front of me with like a bow tie that could be worn by—if the OJs had a clown act.

(They laugh and agree.)

And then he’s got on red cargo pants. He’s got on a fireman—

Angelo Moore: Actually, I got a kilt on!

Jesse Thorn: Oh, that’s a kilt?! Okay, there we go!

Angelo Moore: It’s a kilt, oh yeah.

Jesse Thorn: Red cargo kilt. He’s got on fireman suspenders. Those are fireman suspenders, right?

Angelo Moore: Kinda like (rattling), crystal neck.

Jesse Thorn: Yeah. You got some stones around your neck, some grand stones around your neck, a kufi on your head. And it—look, it all looks like a million dollars. I’m not here to say anything bad about it.

Angelo Moore: (Laughs.) Right on. Thanks, man.

Jesse Thorn: But you’re deeply committed. You’re deeply committed to the wild outfit.

Angelo Moore: Yeah, all the time.

Chris Dowd: It’s been like this since we were in high school, man. Straight up.

Jesse Thorn: I love it.

Angelo Moore: Straight Jim Dandy. Jim Dandy, hardcore! (Laughs.)

 

Music: “Living On the Upside Down” from the album Stockholm Syndrome by Fishbone.

Living in the upside

Living in the upside

Living in the upside

Living in the up—

 

I’ve come to your planet from outer space

ChatGPT is my soulmate

(Music fades out.)

 

Jesse Thorn: We’ll wrap up with Chris and Angelo from Fishbone. After the break, we’ll talk about the time Chris spent away from the band and what brought him back. Keep it locked. It’s Bullseye from MaximumFun.org and NPR.

 

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(Music ends.)

 

Transition: Thumpy synth with light vocalizations.

Jesse Thorn: I’m Jesse Thorn. You’re listening to Bullseye. I’m talking with Angelo Moore and Christopher Dowd. They’re founding members of the band Fishbone.

How did you figure out how to balance the tightness that the band had to have to play that fast and to have—you know—horn arrangements and stuff with the wildness and intensity of the punk rock that you were playing?

Chris Dowd: It was sheer— I think I would describe it as we just didn’t know any better.

Angelo Moore: Yep! We sure didn’t!

(They laugh.)

Chris Dowd: Like, is that—? Was that mean?

Angelo Moore: We didn’t know any better.

Chris Dowd: We were just trying to do it and had no idea that what we were doing was that. We just wanted it to be tight.

Jesse Thorn: Because I’m like watching video of you guys as teenagers or early 20-somethings. You know, like I said, the Specials—you know, they’re like pointing their trombones forward, and then go to the right, to the left, to the right, to the left. You know what I mean?

Angelo Moore: Showmen! Showmanship!

Jesse Thorn: And I’m watching you guys. Somebody’s like holding a trumpet in one hand and their mic in the other hand up against the trumpet running around the stage with no shirt on while playing horn charts! Like, while playing what they’re supposed to be playing. (Chuckles.)

Angelo Moore: You said charts, huh?

(Jesse confirms.)

See, and charts didn’t have nothing to do with nothing, because there wasn’t nobody reading!

Chris Dowd: No, not at all.

Jesse Thorn: But like, they’re doing what they’re supposed to be doing on beat while also running around shirtless and holding the microphone with one hand and the trumpet with the other.

Angelo Moore: Well, because you wanna feel as free as you want. You wanna be able to dance! Man, look. Look. I gave up pop-locking for music.

[00:25:00]

It was too much to concentrate on all at the same time. All of my detailed dance moves and all of that stuff, all my routines and everything? I couldn’t do— I even quit the band to join a dance group at one point. Man, everybody was mad at me. It was called Royal Flex. Right? So, I stopped Fishbone to do— Or maybe we were Megatron at the time or whatever. Diamonds and Things.

Chris Dowd: Megatron.

Angelo Moore: Yeah, Megatron. And I stopped that to do dance. And then eventually, I got back with the band. ‘Cause I was like—you know, music makes it to where people can dance. So, do I want to be the puppet master or the puppet? I want to be the person creating the music to make the dancer dance. That’s kind of what was in the back of my head. So, I couldn’t do both at the same time, you know? So, I just like—“Well, here I go with the music.” And the energy of the dance just came out the way that it did with all the skanking and everything else.

‘Cause you know, at least I didn’t have to concentrate on doing waves or like remembering choreographed routines and stuff like that. So, that’s just the way it came out, man, with the music, and then how we physically interpreted what the music made us do.

 

Music: “Dog Eat Dog” from the album Stockholm Syndrome by Fishbone.

It’s a dog-eat-dog leapfrog

It’s a quid pro quo hand job

You a Peter Pan with magic in your pocket

It takes a criminal mind to put the shackles on and lock it… (Y’all)

(Music fades out.)

 

Jesse Thorn: How is it different now that you’re 60-year-old men?

Chris Dowd: Um, I…

Jesse Thorn: You have been in and out of the band, Chris.

Chris Dowd: I, uh—(sucks in a breath through his teeth). Yeah, but my soul…

Angelo Moore: Come on! Don’t be shy!

Chris Dowd: My soul is—my soul is always where the music is. I mean, I left in ‘94, because we were having some creative differences, and I was in complete disagreement in a lot of the choices that were being made, the record that we were working on. And I was like, “I’m not—”

Angelo Moore: What record was that?

Chris Dowd: Chim Chim.

Angelo Moore: Chim Chim.

Chris Dowd: So, I was like, “Well, if you guys don’t want to hear me, and we’re at this impasse, and you’re treating me as though I’m holding you back, then I’ll just step aside and let you do what you say you need to do.”

You know, ’cause nobody—you know, the thing about being in the band when you have a person—this person sitting to my left—that could power a small community—

(They laugh.)

—with the energy he has that is like, you know, nuclear level. I get it. And to be clear, I was never—I never took anything that was going on with him— Because I know him, and I love him so much, I never took it as it was coming from him at all. I just didn’t agree. And I think that sort of played itself out in what happened.

Angelo Moore: I didn’t get to quit or leave the band like some of the other guys did like, like Chris did. And it’s still hard wrapping my head around him being gone for 20 years! I’m like, “Really?! It was that—?!” So, I didn’t have any concept of time. I just knew I was there playing music, and I would see the faces come, and I’d see ‘em go. And as far as time and a clock and years going by? Man, that didn’t mean nothing to me.

Jesse Thorn: How does it feel for the two of you now? I mean, you guys made a record that is really good. I think it stands with some of your best work.

Angelo Moore: You go first, man.

Chris Dowd: (Chuckles.) For me, it feels like that was the record I wanted to make after Give a Monkey a Brain. That’s as simple as I can put it. That was the record that should’ve been made after Give a Monkey a Brain. Or something closer to that. But after years and years of watching—as your friend, watching you be marginalized creatively— We can agree to disagree on things, but it doesn’t have to escalate to the point where it becomes physical or aggressive or undermining, emotionally.

[00:30:00]

And I… That’s what I stepped away from. You know, you ever see that movie Straw Dogs with Dustin Hoffman?

(Jesse confirms.)

You know, he’s getting his (censor beep) whipped through the whole (censor beep) movie. Right? They attack his family. He’s like, “Oh, it’s not—” And they finally—at the end, he snaps and kills everybody.

(Laughing.) I didn’t wanna—I didn’t wanna be that person!

(They cackle.)

So, I was like, “You know what? I think I’m gonna move to New York and get my trombone out of this bay in this bus and park here for a minute and try to regain some sort of semblance of sanity. And that’s what happened.

Jesse Thorn: Well, let me just say this.

(Everyone cackles.)

Chris, I’m glad you didn’t kill everybody. I’m grateful to meet you guys and for this great record. Thanks for taking all this time to talk to me.

(They laugh brightly.)

Jesse Thorn: Chris Dowd and Angelo Moore. Fishbone. Their new album is called Stockholm Syndrome. You can buy it, download it, or stream it, whatever you gotta do. Just give this one a listen. It’s wild.

 

Music: “All About Us” from the album Stockholm Syndrome by Fishbone, an explosive brass number.

(Music continues under the dialogue.)

 

Jesse Thorn: That’s the end of another episode of Bullseye. Bullseye is created in the homes of me and the staff of Maximum Fun—as well as at Maximum Fun HQ, overlooking beautiful MacArthur Park in Los Angeles, California. Down the street from our office this week at the home improvement store, a guy pretending to be a contractor drove a box truck full of ICE agents into the parking lot where they spilled out of the back and then detained around 15 of our neighbors. DHS said that in arresting what looked on the video like some day laborers and a woman selling cut fruit, they were targeting the international crime syndicate MS-13. To which I say, (skeptically) “Huh!”

Our show is produced by speaking into microphones. Our senior producer is Kevin Ferguson. Our producers are Jesus Ambrosio and Richard Robey. Our production fellow at Maximum Fun is Hannah Moroz. Our video producer is Daniel Speer. We get booking help on Bullseye from Mara Davis. Our interstitial music comes from our friend Dan Wally, also known as DJW. You can find his music at DJWsounds.bandcamp.com. Our theme music was written and recorded by The Go! Team. It’s called “Huddle Formation”. Thanks to The Go! Team. Thanks to their label, Memphis Industries, for providing it to us.

You can follow Bullseye on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube, where you’ll find video from just about all of our interviews—including the ones you heard this week.

And I think that’s about it. Just remember, all great radio hosts have a signature signoff.

 

Music: “All About Us”

Us, us, us, us

Drop your baggage and stop your fuss

Us, us, us, us

(Music fades out.)

 

Promo: Bullseye with Jesse Thorn is a production of MaximumFun.org and is distributed by NPR.

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