Action Skulls

front: Vicki and Rick | Back: John and Billy

Vicki, John and Billy

LA Weekly August 4, 2017 talks of the origins of the Action Skulls:

"At that party (Christmas 2013), hosted by Mumy's Lost in Space castmate Angela Cartwright, Mumy, Cowsill and Peterson found themselves gathered around a piano singing old Beatles and Beach Boys tunes, and realized by the end of the night that they had discovered something special. "We had an interesting blend of three very different-sounding voices," Peterson remembers."

And the Action Skulls were formed. They reached out and snagged Rick Rosas on bass to complete the combo and Billy Mumy went to work writing songs.

Nearly four years after that party, the Action Skulls released their CD Angels Hear on September 29, 2017.

Sadly, Rick Rosas died on cancer before he was able to see the final project.

CD Baby bio reads:

Action Skulls are: John Cowsill, Bill Mumy & Vicki Peterson. What happens when you take a Bangle, a touring Beach Boy, half of Barnes & Barnes and “THE Bass Player” and put them together? Bippity Boppity Boo. Action Skulls. They had gathered at a Christmas party for some festive holiday cheer. Yes, they were casual acquaintances, having run into each other at gigs over the years, but until that party, Vicki Peterson, her husband John Cowsill and Bill Mumy had never sung together. But they did that night. Gathered around an upright piano at Angela Cartwright’s home, they sang until the early hours of the morning. The three of them dug the blend their voices made together and the idea of forming a group was discussed. It was only a few days later that Bill was at a gig with Rick “the bass player” Rosas, and they talked about making music together. Rick texted Mumy late that night to follow up on it. Rick had played with John before and was excited about the concept of recording with Vicki, Bill and John. Mumy started writing. Like a fiend. New songs poured out of him almost daily. The songs were different from his usual solo material, and certainly different than Barnes & Barnes. He left many of these new songs partially completed so that Vicki and John could add their own creative powers to them. A recording session was booked. The four of them gathered at ReadyMix Music, which back in the day was where Jackson Browne and Little Feat worked. ReadyMix has a cool vintage vibe mixed with modern tech. They recorded old school. All four of them together in the same room playing at the same time, making eye contact and damn the leakage. And it was good. It was real good. And it was fun. They planned to record an album’s worth of original material. But between the busy touring schedules of The Beach Boys, (John has been the drummer in that iconic band for 16 years); Rick’s European tour with Neil Young and Crazy Horse as well as his work on Meryl Streep’s film “Ricki and the Flash”; The Bangles heading back out on the road; and Mumy making a film and producing projects; getting the four of them together to record became somewhat sporadic and difficult. But they all made room in their busy schedules to do just that because… they were ACTION SKULLS. Yes, the name had been decided upon early in a very late night text exchange between John and Bill. John had suggested naming the group Action Figures. Bill had suggested Peace Skulls. They compromised, much to Vicki’s chagrin and Rick’s delight. More songs were written. More recording sessions happened. More good vibes. Until the terrible, unexpected, sad and tragic loss of Rick. He died November 6, 2014. The Action Skulls project was put into suspended animation. Vicki, John, and Bill returned to their other individual commitments and got on with their lives. But the eight songs that they’d recorded with Rick on bass haunted them. They’d had a great time creating them and if these were some of the very last recordings Rick Rosas played on, then surely they deserved to be shared with the world. More songs were written. More sessions happened. Mumy played bass on two tracks and John’s son, Will Cowsill, played standup bass on the other. It felt right. Now they needed some time to polish it all up, mix it and get the design together. They had initially come together at Angela Cartwright’s, so it was only fitting that the iconic, multi-talented artist should photograph the group and design the CD package. So she did. And after a bit of, “can you make that more blue?” and “Look! There’s an ORB in these shots! It’s Rick!” the final design fell together. Then, there was a need for a title. A line from Vicki’s song, “Map of the World” fit perfectly. “There be angels here.” John wisely tweaked it.

In a August 24, 2017 and September 28, 2017 interviews, Billy shared some fun facts.

1. One reason for the name Action Skulls was that the three individuals all played in bands beginning with B's. Billy with Barnes and Barnes, John with Beach Boys, and Vicki with Bangles. They wanted a name that if there was an alphebetical bin of music, Action Skulls would come before the B bands.
2. Rick played on eight of the eleven songs.
3. In the initial stages, Billy would record videos and send to John and Vicki. Vicki dubs these the "Bathrobe Demos".
4. Rick had a saying that followed them through this project. Rick:"You can't erase it if you don't record it."
5. Rick appears as an orb above John's head in the photo on the back cover.

Members:

Billy Mumy – vocals, bass and guitar
Vicki Peterson - vocals and guitar
John Cowsill – drums
Rick Rosas – bass
Will Cowsill - bass
Robby Scharf - bass (live show)
Greg “Harpo” Hilfman - keyboards (live show)

Recordings:

Facebook Photos:

John, Vicki and Billy

Rick, John, Vicki and Billy

Billy, Vicki and John

Billy

Vicki and John

Rick

Signing CD's

Review

Bill Mumy, Vicki Peterson, John Cowsill: Action Skulls Say Hello. And Goodbye?

(Photos by Lisa Margolis)

It was a debut farewell and a farewell farewell Saturday at McCabe’s.

The former was the first, and only, concert by Action Skulls, the trio of Vicki Peterson (the Bangles), John Cowsill (the Beach Boys and, of course, the Cowsills) and Bill Mumy (Barnes & Barnes and a lot of other things, musical and otherwise, including… well, you know.) They’re busy people. Doing more shows would be problematic. So this one, celebrating the recent release of their album, “Angels Hear,” will be it.

The latter was the last show put on there by the venerable venue for its long-time booker and producer Lincoln Myerson.

It was Myerson who made the “debut farewell” quip as he introduced the band while standing, as has been his custom, on the steps leading up to the side of the stage. And re his own leave-taking, off to New Zealand with his fiancée for new adventures, he got ever-so-slightly misty as for one last time he gave his admonishment to the fans to turn off their phones and fully enjoy the music and instructed us all that should there be any emergency we should grab a guitar from the wall and head out the back exit.

“If we like the guitar, we’ll find you,” he said.

Both of these goodbyes get asterisks, though, at the very lease. Let’s just go on record here: Action Skulls will be back. And so will Myerson. His return is a given. He’s planning to be back in town for a stretch in four months, and will continue in a key role, even long-distance, as McCabe’s will be doing various shows throughout the year to celebrate its 60th anniversary. There will be continuity and a smooth handoff to Brian Rodriguez and Koko Peterson, both of whom have worked alongside Myerson for a while now and will take over the duties. Just as it was when Myerson took over from Zacharia Love, who succeeded John Chelew, who stepped up for his original McCabe’s concerts boss Nancy Covey.

As for the Skulls, they and the audience were having so much fun, it’s hard to imagine that they won’t be doing this again. Sometime. Somewhere. They all but said so. With each reference to this being the only show, to mentions of their busy schedules — drummer Cowsill’s in particular, with the Beach Boys seemingly on the road all the time — there was a less-and-less-subtle wink-wink.

This is clearly a labor of love (well, Peterson and Cowsill are a delightfully wedded couple with rare occasion to work together) and friendship, a mutual admiration society. Cowsill noted on stage that he’d long been a fan of Mumy’s music, which reminds him of his late brother Barry. The band, such as it is, grew organically out of a spontaneous session around the piano at a Christmas party hosted by Mumy’s “Lost In Space” TV sister, Angela Cartwright, a few years back. Sharing love and roots in ‘60s sounds, Mumy recounted at McCabe’s, they played songs they knew, songs they didn’t, and as the session stretched long into the night-morning, and the spirits (not, specifically, the holiday kind) took increasing hold, the selections became both sentimental and sad.

The spirit (if not spirits) of that marked the show Saturday. There was banter galore — teasing, false starts, sideways glances, shoutouts to people in the audience — and a real looseness (the good kind) that powered the music too, mostly the songs from the album, mostly written by Mumy. (Cowsill marveled at his prolificness, while joking that they have much blackmail material in the nearly daily iPhone video demos Mumy, usually in a bathrobe, would send them.) Lead vocal duties were shared, Cowsill, with a very winning voice, naturally sweet and sturdy, taking the larger portion. But not surprisingly the highlights had them singing together, a perfect balance of Mumy’s somewhat gruffer tones blending with his compadres. Bassist Robbie Scharff and keyboardist Greg “Harpo” Hilfman filled out the arrangements , which echoed the ‘60s without even being slavishly retro, from the Byrds-via-the Mamas and the Papas “Mainstream” to the Buck Owens-via-Beatles “Feed My Hungry Heart” (see video below). Even when they veered psychedelic on “The Beast and the Best” — Peterson singing lead and Hilfman given room to stretch on a “freaky” solo — it never got hokey hippie.

As casual as the project may have been, the songwriting is anything but. The best of the bunch have some levels to then, explorations of love and meaning. “Faith Waltz,” Mumy explained, is an admiringly curious look at the earnest, heartfelt beliefs many hold, even if he doesn’t share them. “Standing on the Mountain,” one of two songs with all three getting writing credit, had them trading verses about being in different places, but seeking connection.

And threading through the show there were other farewells, these without asterisks. Loss of various kinds was a running theme of the night. Peterson’s “Map of the World” pays tribute to her late father. “If I See You In Another World” — well, the title tells the tale. And in a mid-show acoustic session, they reprised one of the songs that they had done late in the original Christmas party session, the Everly Brothers’ “So Sad (To Watch Good Love Go Bad)” and then honored mutual hero Tom Petty — who Peterson said that she had the thrill of singing with last year — with the departed rocker’s tender ode to his adopted state, “California,” the three of them fashioning luminescent harmonies.

A big farewell was saved for the encore. Rick Rosas — “Rick the Bass Player,” as he was known far and wide — was the fourth member of Action Skulls through most of the album’s making a few years ago, but died unexpectedly in Nov. 2014 at age 65. Rosas, best known for his decades of work with Neil Young and Joe Walsh, has the distinction of being the only bassist to play with Buffalo Springfield (the reunion shows of 2011), Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young and in Young’s Crazy Horse (he’d taken over for an ailing Billy Talbot for a 2014 tour). Wistfully talking about how much they’d loved having him as part of the band, and how much he’d enjoyed playing with them, the Skulls paid perfect tribute to him with a version of Young’s “Helpless.”

Helpless. A feeling of saying goodbye. A real goodbye.