I recently had the pleasure of interviewing Chris Dowd, founding member of the legendary genre-bending band Fishbone. We discuss the band’s upcoming new album, Stockholm Syndrome. He also discusses the current political climate, his thoughts on Kid Rock, being a Cordon Bleu-trained chef, among other topics.
Also, for those who prefer to read, here is the transcript, slightly edited.
Ongoing History of Protest Music (OHPM): Your band has a considerable legacy. When you started over four decades ago, did you ever think you would still be making music together?
Chris Dowd (CD): In some variation absolutely. You know myself and Angelo (Angelo Moore, co-founding member), even when I took a we’ll call it an extended hiatus from the band, we always remain friends. Myself and Kendall Jones (also a founding member) as well. I’m still maintaining those relationships. I feel good about that. You know nothing is perfect. If four decades of being an artist mean anything, it’s like you have to meet people where they are. That’s true at all times, so that’s where I am.
OHPM: The band definitely has a considerable legacy, and that legacy is ongoing. You’re continuing to make music, and that includes your ninth studio album, Stockholm Syndrome, which will be released June 27th. We already mentioned that there has been a bit of a hiatus, so I know you recorded the EP in 2023, but prior to that, there was a long stretch between recording, and I know you took a personal hiatus. Does that hiatus affect the recording
process?
CD: You mean when I left the band in 1994?
OHPM: Yes. Is it just like riding a bike, or do you have to get adjusted again?
CD: I guess I wouldn’t even refer to that really to be honest with you as an hiatus. I mean I I quit because I felt that it was going in a creative direction I didn’t agree with. I was trying to be a little more diplomatic, I refer to it as an extended hiatus sarcastically, but no it was like I was not feeling the direction it was going in. I feel like music is a very powerful thing. It’s a powerful gift and opportunity we’ve been given and I really try to honor that because I you know I realize that saying how it takes a village. I think music is the same in that regard it takes a village of people to sort of support a person being able to maintain being an artist. Then on this other side I feel like I have this obligation to be a voice for the voiceless. It’s not not an obligation in the in a negative sense it’s like it’s an amazing obligation and opportunity to be gifted to put emotional intention and words and feelings into a form that speaks to people on a sensory level. That is really identified with the things we probably all struggle with internally, purpose, insecurity, ego. I can speak to those things, you know we all kind of have the most foul parts of the ego we have to struggle with. sort of
I often you know look at some people that I’ve admired like Chris Cornell or Anthony Bourdain. These people that on the surface have these perfect existences but really struggled emotionally and spiritually about a lot of things, so I just take Layne Staley, people like that that I’ve known, I take that I’m here as a gift. Especially in the last 24 years I’ve lost people that are really close to me like my friend Amp Fiddler passed away and Jeff Buckley, so I just take all of this like it is not as a given. Those people made social and creative contributions to music at large that will be touching people for the foreseeable future. I try to always bear that in mind with every sort of creative endeavor I embark on.
OHPM: That is something that’s always stood out to me about your music that it’s always touched upon different
social issues and humanity struggles. I have an advanced copy of the new album and it’s something that really stood out, this album is definitely influenced by the current political climate. I just wanted to ask about the the title Stockholm
Syndrome, was there any significance with that being the album title?
CD: I think of these sort of charismatic cults of personality type leaders that we’ve had. It could be a head of state, it could be a record company president, it could be a film company. You know I believe that with great power comes great responsibility. On the flip side of that with great power comes decadence, and and not that there’s anything wrong with decadence, I like a good meal, some people that some people consider that decadent. The decadence I speak to is like you know six-seven years ago there was a photograph… it was of a three or four year old Latin girl that had drowned to death crossing the southern border of the United States and that was when they had the stay in Mexico policy. Anybody that’s going to walk from Venezuela or walk from whatever war torn country to try to seek some level of freedom because that’s what was inscribed on the Statue of Liberty, to to be met with not
just like you can’t come in, but we’re going to set up a way for you to potentially lose your life… These people are born into this sort of like you know system that they have very little awareness of how they have benefited from 400 years of slavery that built an economic infrastructure that the people at the top of could capitalize off of. You know if you looked at what African-American people have done for this country, just in the equity that was built into it from its inception and to have it be treated with such disregard and disrespect, you know it’s insane.
So I think Stockholm syndrome speaks to this sort of like in the sense that you know when the captor you know identifies with you know the person or people that enslaved them and built a system around to justify it. Then it’s not enough you just have to keep on taking and lying and building these distractions around the truth. That’s definitely the case which the truth is just the truth, it’s not malleable. You know what I mean? It’s the truth but you know everybody wants to try to tell the truth from the perspective of like what’s best for themselves and not what’s best for the collective. So the record really speaks to that as much as anything…
OHPM: Your comments there made me think of one of the songs that you co-wrote “Racist piece of Shit.”
CD; No I wrote that, I didn’t co-write it.
OHPM: Oh you wrote it. That’s a powerful song. There’s one lyric that stood out to me, it says “Drinking the Kool-Aid of a mad orange king, another Kid Rock with all the hate talk.” So obviously Mad Orange King is Trump, but thinking about Kid Rock and your comments about white people profiting from black people, you have someone who started off as a white rapper, who made a lot of money from black culture. So. what are your thoughts on that?
CD: I think he’s a douchebag, straight up, culture vulture douchebag… That’s the thing is like you know black folk in America are so accepting and forgiving and have turned the cheek so many fucking times that just even where we find ourselves in this political climate, you know there’s an entire group of people that are like “No we’re not going to go down and protest and and and show up.” You know you created this mess you know you own this society. You say it yours you know and you are beyond reproach or contempt, okay cool, well if that’s what it is then then clean it up. Cuz at a certain point we’re like you know what we’ve we’ve we’ve sat in enough counters and sit downs and standups and jump arounds and whatever the fuck you want to call it. Like you had enough, you want to save your damn selves…
You’re not going to put a target on my back, no, however if you come up in my crib you gonna fuck around and find out that it’s still real and that’s where a lot of black folks are. I both agree and disagree with that. Unfortunately we’re probably going to have to save this country again. But how does that benefit us in a society that still treats the greatest arbiters of culture and identity in this country, you know you still treat me like I’m a third fourth fifth class citizen.
You know all these people sitting up here crying about you know their jobs. Well last time I checked Dylan and Scooter were not going to be in a field in central California picking grapes. So this fucking idea of all this bullshit that people be on, as far as I’m concerned they can eat a bag full of dicks and Kid Rock can take a couple out of the bag full of dicks and chomp on the motherfuckers himself. Like you gonna steal from my culture and appropriate shit and then fuck around and pretend like it didn’t happen, like come on. Ray Charles could see that shit.
OHPM: The other song I know you wrote was “Last Call in America” and that basically addresses a lot of what we just discussed. I know you described it as “a warning call to humanity, to recognize the inflection point that is tearing the soul of this country apart.” We sort of touched upon it, but what specifically is that inflection point that you’re referring to?
CD: I’m going to explain this by telling you a story about my family. Barack Obama had just secured becoming the
Democratic elected representative for president of the United States. I thought at the time that you know America had
evolved not to this perfect place, it is ridiculous to conceive that him becoming president would end racism yeah but at least it it it was a statement saying that you know a person of color could reach the highest office in the land. My mother thought it was the worst thing that could have ever happened in this country and I was so upset and angry
with her for saying that… I thought it was so crazy and mean-spirited and anything else you could think of. She said “Remember I told you first that this is going to take this country back 50 years, because America is not ready for a black man to lead.” She thought it should have been Hillary. We argued about that through his entire presidency and the minute Donald Trump came down that escalator, Yyah i was like “Holy shit.”
It ended a lot of friendships with people for me, yeah because I had a friend that I’ve known since I was a teenager tell me that they thought it was funny. Angelo and I argue about this, he’s like “He’s the greatest entertainer in the world.” He doesn’t mean it in the sense of it’s entertaining he means it in the sense of this is the like the greatest distraction. You know in the world while people get robbed and and America is the king of making these kind of deals, they did it in reconstruction, they did it in Jim Crow, they do it because we don’t want to face the ugly truth that we enslaved people to have this equity and until we take responsibility for that and stop pretending that it’s not a fucking thing. We’re just going to be a circular firing squad.
Some of my bandmates they get worried because they know how outspoken I am… It’s like you said, it’s like we’re at a tipping point. I think we’re way past that tipping point. I think the minute he became president after Joe Biden, it unleashed the ugliness in this country. As a black man it would be very hard for me to trust people in this country, at this point I don’t feel like being here, I don’t feel welcome here. I know a lot of other people of color that feel that same way and you cannot tell me otherwise because it be like asking me to not believe what I’m seeing with my own eyes… I’m not going to pretend to be that naive anymore because it makes somebody feel uncomfortable, they should feel uncomfortable with racism. People should feel uncomfortable with the lie that’s being propagated. Do you think that these billionaires that yearn to become trillionaires give less than a fuck about you? They will weaponize racism to hold on to power and when they’re done with you, know whoever the poster child for their rage or their hatred is, your ass is next and make no mistake about it. Because then it’ll be well you’re not purely white enough, or you’re not Catholic enough or you’re not Jewish enough or whatever, because these kind of people to maintain power they will move the goalpost as many times as they can and you are just a stupid fucking puppet that went along with it till you figured out oh shit, now I’m in the hot seat.
My friend likes to remind me of I think it it was like “first it was the trade unionist and I said nothing” and then it goes down this whole list and then it was me and there was no one left to speak for me. That’s where we are, we’ve been there since that asshole came down that escalator yeah and well I don’t understand how the South and want to keep up their monuments. They want to believe this lie about the Civil War, it’s like you’re lost, and with good reason. Because to war and to subjugate each other and to tear people down for money and because of the color of skin is insane. It’s the most debased way to live in any civilized society and yet we find ourselves here. I’m sorry, excuse my rant.
OHPM: No worries, the band’s always been known for it, At one time it was Reagan and the Cold War and now it’s what’s going on now.
I am going to switch gears a bit, because I know you’re also a cordon bleu trained chef, so I thought it would be kind of interesting to ask, are there any similarities with the creative process between creating music and the culinary arts?
CD: Absolutely. It’s like food is such a sense of cultural pride for people, and it’s also like you combine these elements of things that are not supposed to fit together sometimes…When I stopped doing music I wanted to do that plus to be honest with you at a certain point I had so many people coming up to me yelling “Fishbone,” “Fishbone,” and I wanted to sit in the back and just cut up vegetables and cook food and be anonymous.
I tell you something funny, I went to culinary school i wanted to get as far away from music and Fishbone as I could and the second day of school three of my instructors walked in with Fishbone shirts on and started pointing at me going “Ah we see you.” I’m like “Great.” I felt like Michael Corleone and Godfather 3. Every time I try to get out, they drag me back in. You know so it’s funny in that way, but yeah that is literally why I did it, I just wanted to be like you know, the De La Soul album, And the Anonymous Nobody. I’ve learned in life it’s like the farther you run away from yourself the more you have to face it.
OHPM: I guess that’s just goes to the legacy of the band.
CD: Yeah, I think it’s like a metaphor for our society. The the farther you run away from your own sort of like power or your own sort of like honor and and honor to yourself and what you stand for, the more it chases you, to show up in those places where you’re expected to stand for something. Yeah, like you don’t stand for something you fall for anything.
OHPM: You have the new album coming out June 27th, Stockholm Syndrome. I know you’re currently on tour. So, is there anything else you want to plug?
CD: I have we have the last few copies of a record I did when I quit the band that a lot of people don’t know about. It’s called the The Seedy Arkhestra. It’s myself and and like like you know Amp Fiddler and Jeff Buckley and my friend David Ryan Harris and my friend Ed Davenport from Brand New Heavies and just a lot of people that showed up for me when that record came out, you guys should check it out. But really I would say that Stockholm Syndrome is a return to Fishbones roots politically, socially, emotionally, and especially musically…
You know a lot of my peers and contemporaries haven’t said a lot about what’s going on politically and haven’t sort of stood up for anything other than I guess making more money. I wish they would come out and say something. I have a voice and I appreciate that anybody would listen to anything I would say. Give it a listen, I think it’s not just a amazing message but it’s really amazing musically. There’s a lot of our heart and soul in this one and so I would just ask that
people really try to give it a listen and you know really check out our greatest offering. It might be the theme song to help us all get over the hump.
