D. Boon and Friends

D. Boon and Friends is a music CD compiling various jam session and live recordings featuring the late Minutemen guitarist and frontman D. Boon. The album is the inaugural release of the Hermosa Beach, California-based label Box-O-Plenty Records, started by Boon's one-time roommate Richard Derrick. Most of the tracks are living-room jam sessions (on guitars, bass and cheap keyboards) done by Boon, Derrick, and Crane, who had previously contributed backing vocals and trumpet parts to the Minutemen's Buzz or Howl Under the Influence of Heat and Project: Mersh 12-inch EP's.

Also heard on the album are live recordings of a one-time project band featuring Boon and three percussionists under the band name Hammerdown, a rare D. Boon acoustic solo show, a tape of a noontime Minutemen gig with Derrick substituting for drummer George Hurley (who couldn't get time off work to participate in the show), and an experimental demo recording featuring D. Boon overdubbing three different lead guitar parts over a rhythm guitar track.

The cover art of D. Boon And Friends is derived from a Christmas card Boon had given Derrick in 1984.

Mike Watt, as curator of the Minutemen legacy, gave the project his blessing, as did D. Boon's late father. Watt, former Meat Puppets drummer Derrick Bostrom, Crane, and Richard Derrick all contributed liner notes.

In keeping with a Minutemen crediting tradition, Boon and many of the other participants are credited with "singing" instead of "vocals."

The first pressing of the CD had a purple cover. Current pressings have the front cover printed with an off-yellow background. Customers who order the CD directly from the label also receive a bonus 23-minute CD-R of other Boon/Crane/Derrick jam sessions and solo live tracks that didn't fit into the original track sequence.