***"For the better part of the last four decades, San Francisco Bay Area musician Larry Boothroyd has been pushing the boundaries of punk and heavy music. Co-founding iconic North Bay avant-punk trio Victims Family with guitarist/singer Ralph Spight in 1984 when the bassist was still a gangly teenager, Boothroyd set a new bar for four-string virtuosity over the course of six albums of genre-busting jazz punk and countless tours with the band. In addition to other collaborations with Spight with affiliated groups Saturn’s Flea Collar, Hellworms and currently as members of Jello Biafra’s Guantanamo School of Medicine, the bassist also played a key part in both ferociously psychedelic experimental punk outfit Triclops! and NorCal hard-rock heavyweights Brubaker.
Boothroyd might be the main creative force behind his latest project Specimen Box, but the recording is about as far from a “solo” album as can be imagined. Inspired by his first experience in remote recording with Victims Family in 2012, the bassist put a call out to his legions of past and present band mates, weird punk contemporaries, fellow travelers and kindred spirits. He asked for one minute of music, from solo players and full bands, in any tempo, time signature or key.
Over the past eight years, Boothroyd has been collecting, collating and organizing those 60-second snippets, fleshing them out with his own contributions and those of other musicians to gradually build the four 20-minute suites of sublimely chaotic and endlessly engaging instrumentals that make up Four Walls. Featuring a whopping 113 different players -- including members of his own bands as well as Nomeansno, Alice Donut, Fear, Scratch Acid, Broun Fellinis, Rova Saxophone Quartet, Butthole Surfers, Fear, Primus, Earthless, Trans Am and a myriad of others -- Boothroyd came up with a new term for the recording: “Kaleidophonic Hybrid Fidelity.” Packed with neck-snapping, ADD shifts in mood and musical style, the dizzying sonic journey finds its closest antecedents in the early efforts of Mr. Bungle and the landmark 1990 debut of John Zorn’s Naked City. Not for the faint of heart or weak of stomach, Specimen Box offers up a mind-bending mixtape for adventurous listeners." - Dave Pehling, CBS San Francisco
Collaborates include members of: Victims Family, Saturn's Flea Collar, Hellworms, Guantanamo School of Medicine, Triclops!, Brubaker, White Pee, Skirt Boys, Bar Feeders, Kai Kln, Ricky & Del Connection, Walrus, Blüchunks, Schlong, Operation Ivy, Charger, Downfall, Plaid Retina, Plainfield, Capitol Punishment, Dead Kennedys, LARD, Nomeansno, Hanson Brothers, Two Pin Din, Hissanol, Shovlhed, Alice Donut, Sabot, Deep Turtle, Uhgah? Wugah!, BEP, Ed Mudshi, Scale Sheer Surface, Tear of a Doll, Dot Dot Dash, Removal, Primus, Porch, Scratch Acid, Chaindrive, Unicorn Magic, Butthole Surfers, Ed Hall, Moist Fist, Squat Thrust, Pain Teens, Earthless, Golden Void, Protein, Mother Truckers, Phantom Power, Qui, My Name, Wretch Like Me, Joy Subtraction, Fleshies, Street Eaters, Pins of Light, Peace Creep, Terry Gross, Trans Am, Golden, Fucking Champs, Anywhere, Vertical Scratchers, The Mass, Sleepytime Gorilla Museum, Secret Chiefs 3, Nasalrod, Fear, Bomb, Rhythm Pigs, Fluff Grrl, Stooges, Ultra Bidé, Municipal Waste, Beat Nigs, Griddle, Ugly Janitors of America, Angry Babies, Liar, Brian Kenney Fresno, Sir Millard Mulch, Duckmandu!, Theremin Barney, Ford Pier, Life After Life, Rova Sax Quartet, The Double U, Ruin, Kamikaze Palm Tree, Mayya & the Revolutionary Hell Yeah!, 3 Leafs, Everyone Is Dirty, Fire Mission, Vertical Urge, Moto Still Birth, Deadweight, Zoogz Rift, Broun Fellinis, Black Crowes, Residents...
