The Mighty Mighty Bosstones: Swan Songs.

The Mighty Mighty Bosstones play the Vans Warped Tour at the Gold Coast Parklands on Friday.

Mighty Mighty Bosstones vocalist Dicky Barrett is a popular camper. The call waiting on his phone manages to ring four times during our interview. He doesn’t pick them up.

“I don’t care. This is a long distance call. I don’t want to flip over just to hear some friend going, ‘hey dude, what are you doin?’ I’ve been sitting here all day doing nothing,” he laughs. “All of a sudden when I’m doing something the phone won’t stop ringing.”

As you may be aware, the Bosstones are heading to Australia once more for the Vans Warped Tour. The ska giants were last seen down these parts on the back of their massive 1997 album Let’s Face It (which spawned the monster singles The Impression That I Get and Rascal King), and the band have undergone a couple of changes in the meantime.

“We’ve shifted labels again,” Dicky explains. “We’re on Side One Dummy, an independent label from LA. Hopefully we won’t have to do all the stupid record company things they like to do when an album comes out, you know. I never enjoyed doing the MTV Spring Break. That I remember being particularly bad.”

While the line up of the band has undergone changes in the past, the members that recorded Pay Attention are still the starting team.

“We grew up together so it’s had to tell exactly when the band began. It’s not like, here comes a tour, I have to get together with those guys again. They’re good guys to be around, so it’s all pretty easy. It just started as something to kill time. People are happy when we make records, and people seem happy when we come to pay their town, so you’ve got to be happy with that. I like going on tour and visiting places where people are excited to see us play. It’s what I enjoy.”

Obviously from the band’s longevity you’re pretty good at wasting time…

“Yeah,” he laughs. “We’re great at avoiding real work It’s tough to find the combination. You can find one guy here or one guy there, but when you get eight guys we are all committed to not working, then that’s a real special thing.”

The forthcoming album, titled A Jacknife To A Swan, is due for release just after the Bosstones return from Down Under.

“It just sounds like the Mighty Mighty Bosstones. It sounds like us. I never know. I wait until our record come out, and then people tell me what it sounds like. I’ve learned that if I make what I think is a ska record, people tell me it’s punk and if I make a punk record people tell me it’s ska. I’m a bad judge.”

“It actually feels good this time (to be making records). It didn’t feel good last time we were an independent band. We were on an indie label for quite a while and it got to the point where it was quite unsatisfying. It was nice to move here without the restrictions. There’s a lot of things about being on a major label where your hands are tied.”

Such as not making it out to Australia on the band’s last album, Pay Attention.

“That’s the reason we changed labels. We said, ‘if you’re not going to service Australia properly we’re going to go to another label. I don’t give a fuck’. A lot of things happened. I don’t have a complete understanding of the corporate world, but a whiskey company owns all the record companies in the USA, as is my understanding. And the guys they put in the record companies were drunk. As I went in and said ‘We gotta go to Australia on this album’, and the guys started a fight with me. ‘Fuck Australia’. I knew I had to get out then.”

“I’d rather stay here where people despise me. There’s too much love in Australia. Too much damn love. I’m used to the States where everyone treats each other like shit. That’s where we’re comfortable.”

Surely though, the band must be feeling the love in their home town of Boston.

“Sure, Boston is the greatest city in the world.”

Doesn’t everyone say that about their home city?

“Yeah, everyone says that, but do you know anyone else who’s named their band after their city. Every other city is in second place. Where are you callin’ from?”

I’m in Brisbane…

“Ah, Brisbane. My second favourite city in the world. Boston and Brisbane. It’s almost alphabetical.”