With a 25 year career that can be only be likened to an “ever-lasting gobstopper”, it has been a crazy ride for Florida punk rockers Less Than Jake. Releasing their seminal debut album Pezcore in 1995, Less Than Jake have since been revelled as one of the earliest origins of the ska-punk movement, which notably combined punk rock riffs with reggae-esque horn arrangements.
According to Less Than Jakes’ founding drummer and main lyricist Vinnie Fiorello, the love of punk rock stemmed from his lonely teenage years spent in Gainsville in Florida, which is also where he first met the bands vocalist Chris DeMakes.
“I have always found where I grew up really interesting because it was very much a retirement town, somewhere that people would relocate from elsewhere when they retired. Punk rockers were a rare breed in Gainesville, they were very scarce but very passionate. Chris was on the other side of that, he was sporty and had a girlfriend but he was still a punk rocker,” Fiorello says. “For me, I had been on my own since I was 16 so I was busy getting high off low-grade weed or finding a wave to surf, the perfect street to skate on or looking for girls, just all the shit you do when you’re a teenager. The only difference I had as a teenager compared to everyone else is that I discovered punk rock, and still to this day I love punk rock because that got me through my teenage years.”
With DeMakes and Fiorello going on to create Less Than Jake in 1992, they decided they wanted to approach the punk sound differently to everyone else in the local Gainsville punk scene, which was fuelled by small time basement shows.
“There was nothing ahead of us that was telling us what to do; we could do whatever we wanted. We were talking one time to a friend of mine Max, from the band Last To Go, who had given me a tape and on that tape was this band from the UK called Snuff, and they had done a cover of a song originally by The Specials, and they did it as fast as fuck pop punk, but more from that NOFX side, not like Chicago Pop-Punk but more so the Southern Californian vibe,” Fiorello says.
“The cover used a trombone in it and Chris and I listened to it and said ‘you know what, we should do this’, so we came up with this plan where we would mix these upbeat horn sections with fast pop punk music, which no one was really doing at the time,” he says.
“But the weird thing is, that at the same time we were doing that, there were a few other bands in completely different cities doing similar things; you had ‘Suicide Machines’ in Detroit and ‘Slapstick’ in Chicago and ‘Goes Out’ on The West Coast and other bands like ‘Reel Big Fish’. None of us knew that the other existed, but when we did find each other it was like ‘Holy shit, people out there are doing the same thing’, it was interesting man. It was like finding long lost blood relatives that you didn’t know existed.”
In celebration of their 25 year Anniversary, Less Than Jake will be delivering a very special tour down under, bringing along Australian punk icons Bodyjar for the ride.
“I really like Australia because it reminds me of Florida, so I have always found it comfortable over here. I look forward to it every time there is talk about a tour for Australia, there is never any hesitation; all of us are down for it as it’s always a lot of fun!”
When & Where: Prince Bandroom, Melbourne – October 19
Written by Alex Callan
