It was another hot and sweaty night at The Deli, and The Boom Bang had just stumbled through its song “Spies Like Us.”
Beer was dripping from the steaming air conditioner vent; drinks had literally been flying across the room all night. The band’s guitarist Tommy McKenzie had stripped down to nothing but his underwear, and dozens of people from the street had piled into the bar to see what all the ruckus was.
“We’re The Drunk Bang,” singer James Smith howled across the room before the band set into its last song.
Just another night of debauchery for a young band that has been through a lot.
The Boom Bang cares about one thing, and that’s having fun. The Oklahoma City four-piece puts in the time to promote itself, practice and write new songs but having a good time is at the heart of it all.
The band’s fuzzy brand of surf punk — think somewhere in between The Black Lips and Brian Wilson — lends itself to that.
Live shows have become a manifestation of the mischievous vibe of the quartet’s music, and its stage antics are quickly becoming things of legend, ranging from destroying guitar amps to firework mishaps.
But The Boom Bang’s exploits are rarely preconceived, and never mean-spirited — just a matter of the circumstances the guys keep finding themselves in.
Chocolate milk mustaches
“You can’t say booze,” McKenzie said.
“We’ll just call it chocolate milk,” drummer Charles Whetstone continued.
The band was discussing the origins of that chaotic night at The Deli, which happened to coincide with McKenzie’s 21st birthday.
“We were at the milk store, and [McKenzie] said ‘I want to drink like 20 chocolate milks’ and we warned him he wouldn’t be able to play with all that chocolate milk in his stomach,” Whetstone said with a laugh. “Sure enough, he turned into Tommyzilla.”
“That’s when his pants fell off,” bassist Weston Lorance added.
All the guys had enjoyed their share of chocolate milks leading up to their headlining set. The two opening bands had played, and it was close to show time when the band noticed that McKenzie had gone missing.
They knew McKenzie had left The Deli, but they didn’t think he had gone too far off. “You said you were going down the street,” Whetstone said to McKenzie.
“We didn’t know you were headed down to Braum’s,” Smith added, making the whole group laugh.
The band found McKenzie at Joe’s Taverna 20 minutes until the set. The band wondered if he could even play.
“[Lorance] came up to me and was like, ‘Can you still play?’ and I answered, ‘Man, I can still see,’” McKenzie said, laughing.
“The answer was no, no, he couldn’t play,” Lorance continued.
The set started and quickly spiraled into broken shot glasses, “abstract solos” and partial nudity, with management eventually threatening to unplug the band.
The Boom Bang pulled it together enough to finish the set, kind of.
“The only song I fully remember is ‘Spies Like Us,’ and that felt like it was 20 seconds long,” McKenzie said.
“It’s probably because you kept missing parts of it,” Smith said with a laugh. “The whole show, I was just guessing what to sing.”
Indeed, the tunes were sloppy, but the show was an unforgettable spectacle, one that made up for the messy music.
The night ended with friends of the band bum rushing the stage, crashing over Whetstone’s drum set and smacking at all the band’s effect pedals … a successful, if hazy, experience for the whole band.
“I’ll be the first to admit I had a few too many chocolate milks,” Whetstone said. “We all had some pretty epic chocolate milk mustaches that night.”
Tattoos & Roman candles
But that was just one night of many memorable moments for The Boom Bang.
In March, the band made its way down to SXSW for a few gigs around Austin. Lorance, McKenzie and Smith decided to light off Roman candles during The Boom Bang’s set. The result was an occasion of truth in advertising.
“I shot [the Roman candle off] and it hit me, almost in the eye, and scared the hell out of me … since I didn’t know,” Lorance said, pausing. “So I just kind of threw it, and it landed in the middle of the crowd and shot a few people.
“They weren’t too happy, but the lady who put on the show thought it was hilarious.”
The band had picked up the Roman candles on the way back from a show in Las Vegas … a fitting match for the band’s demeanor.
“There was a lot of chocolate milk to be had in that town,” Lorance said.
The show itself wasn’t entirely remarkable, but while in town, the guys got matching tattoos from an artist whose wife is in Dropkick Murphys. They all said “Swamp City” — in honor of one of the band’s songs.
The trip up to Vegas was long, and the band fought boredom with a game that ended with McKenzie’s car losing electrical power.
“He went to the mechanic after we got back, and [the mechanic] said something like, ‘The only way you could do this is for all four windows to be rolled down at the same time,’” Smith said, laughing with the rest of the guys.
In April, the band played its Norman Music Festival set in the face of an impending lightning storm.
“This was after SXSW and Las Vegas … we figured we could handle a little lightning,” McKenzie said.
“I wasn’t worried because I wasn’t hooked up to any electronics,” Whetstone added.
“You should have been worried,” McKenzie said with a laugh. “You were surrounded by metal … big, huge metal rings.”
Pressed and Sealed
The Boom Bang’s eventful year is being capped off with the release of a new EP, “Bummer Camp.” The four-track album is being pressed on vinyl — something the band has always hoped would happen — and some copies are even being distributed by Matador Records (the home of Pavement and Interpol).
Of course, Whetstone said the release is being put on in true Boom Bang fashion.
“Can you say we’ll have a free keg … of chocolate milk?”
Concert Bill
Who: The Boom Bang with Sh***y/Awesome and Followed By Static
When: Opolis, 113 N. Crawford
Cost: $5, $7 under 21
Additional info: Free beer while it lasts
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JosephusF 1 year, 8 months ago
This article is an embarrassment to the university. Only one line in this whole article describes the Boom Bang's music. The rest of it is merely a recap of their drunken and clothing-free stage exploits.
Our campus has a major alcohol problem that the administration has been trying to solve for years. Instead of denouncing irresponsible drinking, you glorify these "rockers."
What a waste of an article. The quality and relevance of your publication is going down the drain.
boombangsux 1 year, 8 months ago
Tell me bout it! let's chat bout this soon!