by RUPERT BOTTENBERG

Montreal's steadfast ska machine Planet Smashers celebrate a decade of doing their thing this year. In honour of the event, or perhaps just to document the proverbial long, strange trip the band was consistently too drunk to remember properly, their label Stomp is releasing a Smashers DVD next month. It's jam packed with material from day one to right now - videos, concert footage, interviews, bio, discography and all the Catman cartoons from Japan. The only thing missing is the audio commentary, essential to any good DVD. That's why the Mirror rounded up bassist Dave Cooper for a special screening and a few drinkie-winkies. Ska kids, clip and save this. When you get the DVD, pull it out and read it aloud in a Dave Cooper voice at the appropriate moments!

On the introduction - Cooper and singer/guitarist Matt Collyer jawing on a couch: "Very Bob and Doug Mackenzie, I never realized it until now. I was having a bad hair year."

On Catman, the series of Flash cartoon shorts by Japanese animator Ryosuke Aoike that use Planet Smashers music:

"He had good timing, because we had a video that was pulled off the air right after September 11. In it, we'd built a bomb and were going to blow up Westmount Square. We thought, we gotta do something cute, with kittens. This is much better. Catman's such a badass."

On the video for "Wish I Was American," featuring Matt Collyer skipping girlishly on the moon: "It's supposed to look like zero gravity. But there's nothing wrong with skipping! You can call it gay, but gay is the new tough."

On the video for "Rearrange": "This is at the Rialto on Parc. The crowd there, that's all the people in the Montreal ska scene at the time. It was unbelievable, they were all in one room. Tons of people who went on to do promotion and recording and bands and stuff. All the General Rudie guys are in there, and that bunch of skins in the back, you'd see those guys hanging out at Loonies. That's the crowd, man, the '90s ska crowd."

On the claymation video for "Super Orgy Porno Party": "The tongue is pretty good, I like that - the guy licking his own feet. Then here's the guy with the room full of ducks, and this is the best one, the basketball wrestler guy in a dress."

On Collyer's plaid legwear in the video for "My Girlfriend Is a Vampire": "Matt always had the swingin'est pants, the best ones. I always just wore shorts."

On saxophonist Leon Kingstone's facial hair in the live footage from Japan: "We called that ‘the musket,' some sorta gasket that goes with the rest of the package, if you know what I mean - the muff gasket. It's a Leon Kingstone original. He came up with that himself. Everybody loves to hear a guy with a biker moustache sing patois."

On the mention of the fifth album Mighty in the biography section: "Yeah, we got to work on the console that Madonna's ‘Like a Virgin' was recorded on. A dude here in Montreal bought it. If you listen to that album, it's very virgin-like. We could say the dirtiest stuff we wanted and it sounded like Disney, because of that console."

With Mustard Plug, Catch-22 and Big D & the Kids Table at le Medley on Saturday, April 24, 7pm, $17, all ages

>> Music Listings