To me, skills are not enough to guarantee popularity.

Could Fishbone kick Living Colour's ass? Most definitely.

But I don't think anyone could dispute that Living Colour navigated the industry much better than Fishbone. It sucks, but you have to know how to operate within the industry as an artist. Especially for black acts, it's very hard to be completely uncompromising.

I think that uncompromising attitude gained them a lot of credibility among other artists, but it hurt them commercially.

I mean, listening to Truth and Soul, Reality of My Surroundings, and Give A Money A Brain - there is a lot of diversity on those records. And STILL people say none of their albums captured what they were really like live. That is pretty astounding. I mean, damn, if those gave a limited view of the band, maybe it was impossible to capture them in the studio. Some acts are like that. Maybe they should have dropped a live album or video between 1991 and 94.

One thing I didn't know before seeing the movie was that Fishbone wasn't even thinking about a deal. They were happy just doing shows. It shows they maybe they weren't really taking it serious as a career, unlike Vernon Reid.

Even with the Dallas Austin album, I think that could have worked out better for them if they had been willing to compromise. He was trying to give them a hit. But no, Angelo wanted to go theramin crazy (LOL) and Norwood is talking about he wanted to do an underground album.

> And since when are Rock Stars supposed to be well behaved and
> managable? Isn't that the POINT?

I agree. But selling lots of records makes it easier for the label to put up with difficult personalities. Six or seven guys with different ideas on what needs to be done makes it hard to work with a label. Maybe if someone had stepped up to be The Leader things would have been different.

I'm also wondering if Branford, Ice T and Flea had so much love for them, why didn't they try to elevate Fishbone when they were riding high? Do a track with them, hype them during interviews, something.