Singer Angelo Moore of Fishbone performs onstage during day 1 of Warped Tour at Shoreline Waterfront on July 26, 2025 in Long Beach, California. (Photo by Scott Dudelson/Getty Images)
Angelo Moore is the face of Fishbone, known as a highly distinctive and influential L.A. band, fusing rock, ska, punk, funk, soul, metal and reggae music with thought-provoking lyrics. The band’s explosive live shows are legendary, with a constantly evolving lineup of talented musicians, and Moore and his saxophone are always leading the charge.
On June 27th, Fishbone dropped their first new studio album in almost 20 years, Stockholm Syndrome. Frontman Moore took a few minutes away from his busy schedule to share his thoughts about the new album — and the world at large.
Stockholm Syndrome (coverart)
GOLDMINE: I was sitting down to do prep for this interview, and I had written down some notes, including the phrase “Racist Piece of Shit.” My wife walked by and asked if I had issues with the person that I was about to interview. She did not realize that it was a song on the new album.
ANGELO MOORE: Your wife thought you were going to say that to me?
GM: Yep.
AM: Well, that is very funny, those eclectic surprises.
GM: That song is filled with so much energy, anger and frustration.
AM: It’s like hearing the Sex Pistols for the first time.
GM: Yes, you’re correct. I hope people will take the time to really understand the message in the song.
AM: You know what? I even heard that the song got banned.
GM: Congratulations.
AM: All right, it worked. People can listen to the song and make their own judgment based on their beliefs. If any people you know speak in a racist manner, they are a racist piece of shit. And if they don’t like the song and they want to talk about it publicly … well, thank you for advertising our single.
GM: When Fishbone decides to take such a strong stand, with a song like that or “Secret Police” or “Last Call in America,” do you feel like it puts a target on your back?
AM: Well, yeah, hopefully. It’s kind of a target where people will want to hear and listen more, and really see what we’re talking about, you know? And if it takes this type of introduction for people to turn their heads and listen and go, “Who in the funk are these motherf**kers saying this and that, and the other?” and then they keep on listening, Amen. There’s always a solution to the problem that we present. I know that as a writer. Anytime I write something, I always try to present a solution, even if it’s about social matters. Social matters like racism and the disease of vanity. But you know, we all want to be cured of whatever ailment it is — could be spiritual racism or spiritual illness. We all need to be cured. Some people can’t be cured, but the ones that can, sometimes you gotta bite them with a snake to get them to wake the f**k up. Sometimes they need a slap in the face. You know, when you go to the kind of church with all of them holly rollers and they’d be healing their people and somebody gets slapped and they look at the preacher and go, “Oh, Lord!” they fall back, and they come back around. Lord, I’m saved.
“We all want to be cured of whatever ailment it is — could be spiritual racism or spiritual illness.”
GM: Well, I really hope people do take the time to listen to the lyrics. I think it was about the third time I listened to the whole album that I really got to appreciate the message that was coming through all the amazing horns and bass, and getting lost in the rhythm of your voice.
AM: Why is that?
GM: For me, it was the music taken as a whole, and I had not given myself the time to just relax and listen to the message. It’s an amazing album.
AM: Yeah, it has a lot going on, man. It’s a lot of the lineup and lots of experiences from life. When that last lineup was in existence, that came through a lot of trauma. Especially in its adolescent, aggressive behavior. It shows up in “Gelato the Clown,” “Secret Police” and “Last Call in America.” Those are a lot of stress release. It’s what you see around you. The world that we are in. The reality of our surroundings. It’s very challenging and stressful. With all of what’s going on in our country and the decisions that a lot of Americans have made to vote for who they voted for. It put us in the place we’re in now, which isn’t good, and it feels like we are at war, man. When Trump said the enemies are within, he sure was not kidding. He has said, I’m right in there. I’m right next to you mother**ker. The enemy is right next to your ass. And he is a great entertainer. Any great entertainer can captivate and capture their viewer. Hell, I do it all the time. I just ain’t trying to run for President. I’m like a big magnifying glass that sees all the crazy shit going on right now. I’m Peter Pan. It’s like in the song “Dog Eat Dog,” Peter Pans and Tinkerbells. They are the artists.
Sometimes they get snatched up and tied to a post by the record company. With Trump, we elected the joker to be in our lives. We pulled a joker out of the television and into the living room and on the couch next to us, and now it ain’t funny no more. We need to just leave the joker in the TV. Everyone like him just needs to have their ass left in their fantasy land. Now he’s in everybody’s real life and throwing bombs at everyone. “What is that in Iraq? Just drop a bomb on it.” What the fuck do you think that’s gonna do to us over there? Next thing you know, churches and elementary schools are gonna be blown up and nightclubs and all this sh*t, where somebody will walk in there with a bomb on their chest and pull the string, worst case scenario, and it’s happened before. That’s why I can say it now. We sing about these types of things; that’s reality. When you see it, it’s hard to ignore it. That is what a lot of this record is about.
GM: Let me say it again, people really need to take the time to listen to this album.
AM: There is another song called, "My God is Better Than Your God." Did you hear that one?
GM: Yes.
AM: It’s about what is going on in Gaza; All that Israel and Palestine bible shit.
GM: For those people who may not be familiar with Fishbone — how do you describe the band to somebody who’s never heard the music before?
AM: Well, it’s alternative underground, man. It’s soul-based and uses a lot of little different genres. Adventurously intellectual lyrical content.
GM: In my made-up fantasy origin story of Fishbone, I walk into a high school band room, and I see these amazing musicians playing in their high school band who come together and say, “We need to start a band.” What is the real story?
AM: How did Fishbone get started from the very beginning? You are kind of right, but it was Junior High. It was right around the beginning of the inner-city busing program, where they wanted to integrate the schools in California. I was already attending a school in the San Fernando Valley. The rest of the guys were getting bused in from South Central Los Angeles. We all used to listen to the same music like Rick James, Funkadelic and James Brown. All of us pretty much grew up on the same stuff at home. So, we liked to get together, and we would listen to our favorite songs at lunchtime, and we would be in the music room playing music. Then we realized we all wanted to all play together.
GM: Did you start with the sax or play the clarinet initially and then switch over?
AM: I not only started with the saxophone, I started with the alto saxophone.
GM: Was music a big part of what was going on at home?
AM: Yeah, man. My dad played in Count Basie, as a tenor saxophone player. My mom was an English teacher. They had a lot of blues, and a lot of soul music playing in the house all the time. They also had lots of story time theater. Things like Jack and the Beanstalk and Jonathan Livingston Seagull. Lots of stuff like that to listen to when I was growing up. That is probably where I get a lot of my poetry stuff through.
GM: Did you have a record collection growing up?
AM: Yep.
GM: Do you still have the collection?
AM: Yeah, the majority of it I got as cassette tapes. I do have some vinyl, 45s and LPs. I still have some of the stuff I got when I was a kid, but I don’t have a lot compared to my mom and dad’s collection of 45s. They used to get tons of 45s.
GM: Is there a holy grail of a record that you wish you had in your collection.
AM: Sly & The Family Stone, There’s a Riot Goin’ On. I really like that one.
GM: Do you remember the first time that you heard Fishbone on the radio?
AM: Yeah, I think it was in the parking lot of Canter’s Deli in Hollywood. Canter’s is this Restaurant that everybody goes to after going out to the club. We were in the parking lot, and it came on the radio. I think it was KROC. Think it was “Party at Ground Zero.” We played it loud on that car radio.
GM: I must ask, did you have a positive experience filming the movie Back to the Beach? I would like to believe it connected you to a lot of people who had no idea who or what Fishbone was.
AM: Back to the Beach … oh yeah, man, I remember it was drizzling that day, but they had all these big lights on the beach that made it look like it was not drizzling at all. It was like, whoa, look at that TV trick. I had the opportunity to meet both of them: Annette Funicello and Frankie Avalon. They were cool people.
GM: Where is the best place for people to buy the new album, fishbone.net?
AM: That is correct. They can buy the album, the CD, or a thumb drive with the music on it. I know most people have it in their heads that thumb drives don’t exist, but we have a really nice thumb drive. It’s good also as a paperweight in the office. It’s nice and shiny and you can even play air hockey with it. More importantly, it contains all the extra mixes on it.
GM: So, there is more than what is just on the vinyl album?
AM: It’s got more. It’s got the whole record, and it’s got the instrumental version so you can do some karaoke with it. I will also let you in on Dr. Mad Vibe, which is my merchandise line. You will find T-shirts, coffee table books and other items. I just released a new book that comes with a USB drive and I’m narrating the whole book. I also got comic books with CDs. I have my art prints out there. It can all be found on drmadvibe.com.
GM: That site is amazing with merchandise.
AM: We have to use the internet to support the band. All the platforms that the music streams on, don’t hardly pay the artists anything. They pay the artist an embarrassing, insulting amount of money. We have to depend on other shit to make money and pay the bills. Come out to the live shows, check out the live artists. Support them. Get their merchandise because that’s the way to keep the artists from starving. I know it might sound cool to outsiders to be the starving artist, but it’s not when you are the goddamn artist that is starving.
