Turn the Radio Off by Reel Big Fish

Turn the Radio Off, the second album from Huntington Beach's Reel Big Fish, came out on Mojo Records in 1996 with Jay Rifkin producing, and it's the record that shoved the band into the thick of ska's third wave. This is ska punk played at a sprint and a sneer, with a horn section big enough to fill a parking lot: Tavis Werts and Scott Klopfenstein on trumpet, Dan Regan and Grant Barry on trombone, over Matt Wong's bass and Andrew Gonzales's drums. Aaron Barrett, the frontman and the one member to survive every lineup shuffle, leads the charge.

"Sell Out" got heavy radio play and crossed over in 1997, later turning up in video games from FIFA 2000 to Disney's Extreme Skate Adventure, and the album went gold. The cover shows KROQ's Jed the Fish at gunpoint, with Barrett's girlfriend at the time holding the weapon. The mainstream moved on soon after, but a cult following stuck around.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.