Buck-O-Nine first came to my attention in 1997, when my friend Raul won a copy of their album 28 Teeth as part of a package of prizes from the local rock radio station. I was in the 8th grade and that album dominated my Walkman for months.
The San Diego ska band have never been strangers to Vegas, and they return to our city on Friday, May 27th, playing a Punk Rock Bowling club show with Fishbone, Guttermouth, and The Scandals at the Las Vegas Country Saloon. Tickets for that show are on sale now.
Last week I talked with Buck-O-Nine’s lead singer Jon Pebsworth about Las Vegas, Punk Rock Bowling, and what it’s like holding the second best job in the world.
Emily Matview: What was it like for Buck-O-Nine during that part of the 90s when ska was getting a lot of extra attention and your song My Town was getting picked up by radio and MTV?
Jon Pebsworth: Well, I have fond memories of it but I also remember it was fun, it was exciting, it was scary, it was weird. There were a lot of hills and valleys during that period, but I think ultimately I look back on it and it was pretty rad. We’d been plucking away as a band for a while before the whole My Town thing came along, so I think it was good for us to finally get a different level of success than we had previously achieved. That was pretty cool. All of our hard work, traveling around the county for months in a van and sleeping on people’s floors started to pay off a little bit, so that was a good feeling. Also at that time it was nice because some of our friends and family who were kinda skeptical about us quitting our jobs and dropping out of college and all that shit, it helped them realize that what we were doing was valid.
What do you think about the state of ska now? Are there any new ska bands that you’re into?
I have heard some newer bands, and I know that a lot of the older bands are still plugging away. The last time I listened to ska music was probably about an hour ago. I was listening to that band Deal’s Gone Bad from Chicago and they’re kinda like a rocksteady band. I would consider them to be fairly new even though they have done a couple of records. Those guys are just awesome. They’re more traditional style which I love and I think that’s a band that stands out for me that will eventually become a much bigger band and hopefully bring some more attention back to it.
During the 90s I think, somewhere in there, it got a little cheesy and gimmicky and the press ran with that. So it did kind of water the whole thing down. I mean, I got into ska when I was a kid, during the tail end of the two-tone era. Those guys were just cool, it wasn’t a gimmick, it wasn’t silly, it was just fuckin’ badass. And then of course I went back and started listening to more of the traditional stuff from the 60s and 70s and eventually Fishbone and the Bosstones and then along came Operation Ivy and I think that is what kind of lit the fire for the 3rd wave. Hearing bands like the Suicide Machines and the Blue Meanies and the Voodoo Glow Skulls, to me, that stuff was incredible. I felt like it had so much heart and was real. Like any scene, bands come along and kind of water it down and make it silly and I think that’s unfortunate but it is what it is. I still look back on all that music and I think it’s still rad.
You’re working for SideOneDummy now?
Yeah, I’m working here at SideOne. Buck-O-Nine kind of stopped doing full-time touring sometime around 2001 and basically I’ve been working here ever since then.
What do you do there?
I’m in charge of the press department. I’m the in-house publicity department. Setting up interviews and all that kind of stuff.
What’s it like doing the behind the scenes stuff compared to being out there with the band?
Well you know, it’s very different, because I sit at a desk all day long and type emails and talk on the phone, which is fine because I’m talking on the phone to cool people that are interested in music. And my job is to deal with bands and people that write about bands and interview bands. It’s fun. It doesn’t have the same feeling that being on stage with your band and traveling around the county, traveling around the world does. There is just nothing that can really compare to that for me. I tell people all the time that I have the second best job in the world. They’re like “Really? That’s cool. Wait, what’s the first best job?” Well, it’s being in the band. You know, it could be worse. At least I don’t have the 550th best job in the world or something like that.
And you still get to do the number one best job too, sometimes.
Yeah, on weekends and stuff. We just played a couple shows last weekend that were really fun and we’ve got a couple more coming up and then we go to Punk Rock Bowling. It’s awesome.
Is there anything coming up at SideOneDummy, anything you want to hype up?
Yeah, actually there is this new band that we signed and their album just came out on Tuesday. They’re called Title Fight and they’re from Kingston, Pennsylvania. They’re a killer band. It’s hard to describe them. It would be unfair to call them a hardcore band because I think they’re much more than that. But their roots are in hardcore, punk, and the early 90s emo kind of thing. They even have a tinge of like Hot Water Music or Jawbreaker. They’re somewhere in that area with their sound. They’re really good, I like them a lot.
We have a new Big D and the Kids Table album coming out in July, the new Reverend Peyton album coming. And new Chuck Ragan is coming soon. So yeah, we’ve got some pretty cool shit.
Buck-O-Nine has played in Vegas a lot. Do you have any memorable shows?
Yeah, I remember one show we had was pretty rad, it was actually at the Hard Rock. It was Voodoo Glow Skulls and us and that was a really cool show. It probably would have been like ‘97 or 98, somewhere in there. That was pretty killer. But I also remember doing smaller shows out there, too. We played a bunch of good shows there at the Huntridge Theater. In fact I think the first time we ever came out to that area we played in Henderson, at some kind of weird hall and we were just standing on the ground, there was no stage or anything like that and there was no security. It was just like some microphones and stuff and everyone was just wasted drunk, people just drinking beer and shit in the parking lot, just getting wasted. I remember driving home from that one thinking “dude, that was fuckin’ awesome, we gotta go back to that Vegas place!” We’ve always had good memories. We always tried to set up our tours so the last day would be in Vegas so we could stick around for an extra day or two and just fuck around and party and gamble and that kind of stuff so that was always fun to end the tour in Vegas.
Are there certain places in Vegas you like to go?
Yeah, for a minute there, every time we would go up there we would stay at the Circus Circus because they have that huge parking lot for RVs and busses and vans and stuff with trailers. And rooms were reasonably priced and then I remember we would go to the casino right next door to it and drink like $1 Sam Adams, and of course we’d go to the Double Down bar.
Our group is pretty fun. I kind of think no matter where the 7 of us are going to be, as long as there are some beers, we’re going to have a good time. We’re all such good friends now and we’ve been together for so long. We’ve really become a family so when we get together it’s just jokes and everyone is making fun of each other, just having a blast. I mean, we could be in a parking lot in the middle of nowhere and we’d have fun.
Let’s talk about Punk Rock Bowling for a little bit. You guys are playing on the first night with Fishbone, Guttermouth and The Scandals at the Las Vegas Country Saloon. Have you guys played or come out to Punk Rock Bowling before?
Yeah, actually, I’ve been coming to Punk Rock Bowling every year for the past 9 years. I love it. That’s why I’ve always thought it would be so awesome if I could play it someday, but I never thought of actually trying to make it happen because I just kind of thought it was never going to happen. And they asked us to play and I was like “oh shit, of course.” We always talk about it. Our drummer has been to Punk Rock Bowling before but all the other guys have never even been to it. I told them all about it. They’re like “man, that sounds amazing, we should all go sometime!” and now that we’re playing of course, we’re all going to go.
Are you going to be playing and bowling this year?
Yeah, I bowl for SideOneDummy and then I’m playing with Buck-O-Nine so I’ll be pulling double duty. But we’re not a very good bowling team so we probably won’t make it to the second day. We’re ok, but it’s not like we’re out practicing and shit. There are some guys that take that shit pretty seriously. Not that we don’t, I personally just don’t have the skills. Even if I wanted to get really good at bowling I probably couldn’t. I just don’t have that skill in my body. I mean, I might roll a couple strikes, I might get lucky. To me bowling is kind of like golf, it’s super hard to be consistently good. Well golf is harder, but it’s similar to that because to get to be consistently good at those types of things you have to have good muscle memory and all that kind of shit and I think I’m just too much of a drunk to deal with that.
Do you have any good stories from the past Punk Rock Bowlings?
Probably, I might have forgotten them all though. I can’t think of anything specific. Nothing colossally worth putting into a story. I just remember late nights at the casino bar, talking to people until 6, 7 o’clock in the morning and then you get a couple hours of sleep before you go bowl and you’re all hung over and shit bowling and it’s just hilarious.
What bands are you looking forward to seeing at the festival?
Well, obviously, the Descendents. That will be my number one choice to make sure I get to see those guys. Luckily I’m old enough to have seen them many times in the past but of course, they’re one of my all-time favorite bands so I definitely want to see them there. I want to see Dropkick Murphys, I’m looking forward to seeing Fishbone, I want to see Drag the River. I kinda want to see ALL, did you hear about that, that all 3 singers are going to sing? That’ll be cool, I’m going to try to see that too. When Dave Smalley did the very first ALL record, that was my favorite one, so that would be pretty cool to see that. I never got to see them with Dave Smalley. I also kind of look forward to hanging out in the casino and saying hello to people that I haven’t seen since last year.
You guys are also playing the Asian Man Records, 15 year anniversary festival. I know your last record came out on Asian Man. How has that been, working with Mike Park?
It’s been great. Mike is an awesome guy. He is so simple and easy to deal with. It was nice because, that’s exactly what we need at this point in our career, if you want to call it a career or whatever. We just wanted something that was going to be simple and cool. Somebody that we could trust and just be able to put our music into the world and not have a big hassle. Because we’re not looking to get back on the road and tour and put this into a full-time thing, so a lot of labels will have higher expectations of what their bands are willing to do. I know, even here at SideOne, if we were talking to a band that plays as many shows as Buck-O-Nine does a year, we probably would be like “well, I don’t know, you guys aren’t really investing as much of your time, so we don’t want to invest that much of our time either.” It’s kinda hard because we play between 8 and 20 shows a year, 20 being a lot. Where we used to play like 250-300 shows a year back in the day. It’s different now.
Any bands you’re looking forward to seeing at Asian Man?
Slapstick. Slapstick for sure. Slow Gherkin and Slapstick are my two main ones that I want to see. I mean, there are a lot of them that I’m stoked on because all his records were good. After that it’s going to depend on timing and whether or not we have to leave San Francisco and head somewhere else. Slapstick was one of those bands that was part of the 3rd wave that I thought was really cool. Those guys are just fuckin’ sick. They’re such a good band. The way that Brandon sings, and he still sings rad with Lawrence Arms and all that. But man, I first heard Slapstick and thought “that is what 3rd wave should sound like.”
Your last album Sustain came out on Asian Man in 2007, do you have any plans for another Buck-O-Nine album any time soon?
Actually yeah, we’re going to start working on some songs in the next month or so. It’s hard sometimes for us because everyone is older and a lot of the guys are married and have kids and stuff and now our bass player lives south of Lake Tahoe in like Yosemite or something, way up there. And I live in LA, and the rest of the guys all still live in San Diego and are super spread out in San Diego County. So for all 7 of us to be in the same room together with our instruments in a proper rehearsal studio, or a proper garage or somewhere to practice, it makes the songwriting process pretty hard. But over this past weekend when we had our little road trip and played a couple shows we had some time to talk about it in the van and we came up with a plan that kind of involved the internet but kind of doesn’t. We thought we might try to do it a little unorthodox and I think we came up with a pretty good little strategy. But yeah, we should have something new recorded and done hopefully by the end of the year sometime or the first part of next year.
Are you going to do that through Asian Man again?
Yeah, probably. If Mike will do it. I don’t think he made a lot of money or sold many copies [of Sustain]. I’d hate for him to lose any money off of us. But I guess we’ll just have to cross that bridge when it comes. You know, get the music together and start recording and then get all the stuff figured out.
Do you have anything else you want to add to the interview before it’s over?
I’m just having a good time doing this stuff still and I’m totally looking forward to coming to Vegas and going to Punk Rock Bowling, it’s going to be awesome.
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