Birth name Dennes Dale Boon Role Singer Name D. Boon | Years active 1978–85 | |
 | ||
Born April 1, 1958,San Pedro, California, US ( 1958-04-01 ) Occupation(s) Musician, songwriter, producer Instruments Guitar, vocals, keyboards, bass Albums 3‑Way Tie (For Last), Double Nickels on the Dime, What Makes a Man Start, The Politics of Time, The Punch Line Similar Mike Watt, George Hurley, Kira Roessler | ||
Wendy D. Boone's Slide Show . Hope you like it.
Dennes Dale "D." Boon (April 1, 1958 – December 22, 1985) was an American singer, songwriter, and guitarist. Boon was best known as the guitarist and vocalist of the American punk rock trio Minutemen. In 1985 he was killed in a traffic crash at the age of 27.
Contents
Youth
Dennes Boon was born in San Pedro, California, on April 1, 1958. His father, a navy veteran, worked installing radios in Buick cars, and the Boons lived in former World War II barracks that had been converted into public housing. As a teenager, Boon began painting and signed his works "D. Boon", partly because "D" was his slang for cannabis, partly after Daniel Boone, but mostly because it was similar to E. Bloom, Blue Öyster Cult's vocalist and guitarist.
Minutemen
Boon formed Minutemen in January 1980 with childhood friend Mike Watt on bass, from their previous band, The Reactionaries, later adding former Reactionaries drummer George Hurley. Their best known album was Double Nickels on the Dime.
Death
The Minutemen continued until December 22, 1985, when Boon was killed in a van accident in the Arizona desert on Interstate 10. Because he had been sick with fever, Boon was lying down in the rear of the van without a seatbelt when the rear axle broke and the van ran off the road. Boon was thrown out the back door of the van and died instantly from a broken neck. He was 27 years old. The band immediately dissolved, though Watt and Hurley would form the band Firehose soon after. The live album Ballot Result was released in 1987, two years after Boon's death.
Musical style
Boon's guitar style is very distinctive; he rarely used distortion and frequently set the equalization on his amplifier so that only the treble frequencies were heard – the bass and midrange frequencies would be turned off completely. His style had a heavy funk/blues feel which was very different from other hardcore punk bands in the 80s.
Artwork
Boon is responsible for the writing and composition of the Minutemen's most anthemic songs (in contrast to Watt's stream of consciousness lyrics), including "This Ain't No Picnic", "Corona", "The Price of Paradise," and "Courage." A lifelong artist, Boon also created drawings or paintings for the Minutemen releases Joy, The Punch Line, The Politics of Time, Project: Mersh and 3-Way Tie (For Last).
Legacy
Since the first Firehose album, Mike Watt has dedicated every record he has worked on – be it Firehose, solo, or otherwise – to D. Boon's memory. A song on Watt's semi-autobiographical 1997 album Contemplating the Engine Room, "The Boilerman," is about D. Boon; on the recording itself, guitarist Nels Cline plays one of Boon's last Telecaster guitars, which Watt is in possession of. Watt also mentions his fallen friend in Firehose's "Disciples of the 3-Way" (Mr. Machinery Operator) and his own "Burstedman" (The Secondman's Middle Stand).
Boon has been paid tribute by American alternative band Stigmata-A-Go-Go with the song "D. Boon," from its 1994 album It's All True, Uncle Tupelo with a different song "D. Boon" from its 1991 album Still Feel Gone, and Centro-matic's song "D.Boon-Free (A Ninth Grade Crime)" off "The Static vs. The Strings Vol. 1." His story is also told in the documentary We Jam Econo.
In 2003, former D. Boon roommate Richard Derrick released the CD D. Boon and Friends, a collection of jam session tapes he recorded with D. Boon, and rare Boon solo performances, as the first release on his Box-O-Plenty Records label. Mike Watt authorized the release and provided technical assistance and liner notes.
He is #89 on Rolling Stone's list of the 100 greatest guitarists of all time: David Fricke's Picks.
In his review of the band's last album, music Critic Robert Christgau described the death of Boon as: "a rock death that has for wasted potential Lennon and Hendrix for company," finishing with: "After seven fairly amazing years he was just getting started. Shit, shit, shit."