The Times - Serving Waitsburg, Dayton and the Touchet Valley

WAITSBURG - If you like con- temporary reggae music or simply can't keep your body from moving to a good beat, you don't have to wait for Ziggy Marley's Wild & Free tour to come to Walla Walla next month.

The two-year-old Tri Cities band Fishbowl will be all too happy to sweep you off your feet with its unique mixture of reggae dub funk fusion at Coppei Café Saturday night, June 30, drummer/vocalist Geoff Bond said in a telephone interview.

"There's no way not to move to this," the band's 23-year-old co-founder said. "It's more than pure roots reggae. It's really great dance music for ev- erybody."

Its origins and influences firmly rooted in reggae, hip hop and world music, Fish- bowl is expected to draw from its repertoire of some 15 originals and an even larger throve of covers for a show that will last at least two and a half hours starting around 7 p.m.

Bond, who happens to be a nephew of Waitsburg resident Allison Bond, hails from Rochester, New York. His parents are Craig and Jenny Bond, world compet- itive ice skaters in the 1970s and 1980s, who met each other at a big international event in Spain and toured Europe for Holiday On Ice.

Growing up in upstate New York, Bond was ex- posed to various musical styles to which he could have applied his singing and drumming talents acquired since he got a toy drum kit at age 2 then replaced with a real one at age 8.

In high school, Bond had a chance to travel to Italy as a member of the Rush-Henrietta School District singers and he later did other musical productions for a community college in Rochester.

He had always enjoyed the likes of Peter Tosh, UB40 and Bob Marley. About sev- en years ago, reggae really got its hooks in him when he became a fan of a Roch- ester band the Giant Panda Guerilla Dub Squad, which throws all his favorite funky music styles in the mix for a great sound, he said.

"I went to as many of their shows as I could and got to know the band," Bond recalls. "I really enjoyed the relaxed feeling behind it and the positive lyrics. There's a lot of optimism in reggae."

After his parents moved to Walla Walla for work opportunities, Bond found his way to the Tri Cities and formed his own reggae band simply by posting his search for musicians on Craigslist.

Bass player Wes Rich- ardson responded almost immediately and the two musicians later met guitarist Sean May and trumpet player Toby Tijerina to complete the group two years ago.

"There wasn't a band playing reggae in East- ern Washington," said Bond, who counts Midnite's Vaughn Benjamin and Thunderbody's Matt O'Brien among his contemporary reggae heroes. "We're playing island music in the desert."

Music lovers responded well to the band's existence and performances. In a re- gion steeped in country music, some people "are really open to hearing something different," he said. "Dur- ing times, reggae is saying things that are uplifting to people."

Fishbowl is now much more than a band, Bond said. It's a community of like-minded people seeking unity and uplifting experi- ences.

To hear samples of Fish- bowl's music, visit www.reverbnation.com/fishbowl- music or www.soundcloud.com/fishbowlmusic.