When the rap/rock band 2 Skinnee J’s jumps on stage as the second act in a three act showcase Thursday at the Copper Dragon Brewing Co., the energy of the two lead singers will contrast with the stern presence of another of the band’s members.

The hard-looking A.J. Stumpy Johnson is described by singer J Guevera as the band’s David Koresh a manager of sorts who hurls insults toward the band during the performance in an attempt to make them play better.

He’s our Jim Jones without the Kool Aid, Special J, the other half of 2 Skinnee J’s vocal attack, said. He stands on stage, and he oversees whatever goes on. He yells like crazy if we make mistakes that he doesn’t like.

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Although he looks pretty much calm on stage because he just sort of stands there, he’s pissed.

The band has been together about five years or, as J Guevera puts it, Johnson has been hiring and firing people for five years.

Along with Johnson, the Brooklyn-based band also has shared stages with the likes of Sugar Ray, A Tribe Called Quest, Coolio, George Clinton & the P-Funk All Stars and, in Thursday’s show, Big Ass Truck and the headlining ska act The Urge.

While many bands feel their music is beyond categorization, 2 Skinnee J’s avoid the musical clich and classify their arsenal of songs as rap/rock even if the singers say the label demeans the genre or vice versa.

2 Skinnee J’s might be immediately compared to Public Enemy, but the singers keep the comparisons to as bare a minimum as possible in homage to one of their greater influences.

We love Public Enemy. There’s no question, J Guevera said. But we would never dare compare ourselves to them except the fact that they have microphones and we have microphones.

The comparisons do stretch a little farther than that because both acts have a rock base with rap vocal flavoring. But as far as the band’s live shows go, 2 Skinnee J’s look to a powerful force in the funk movement of the 70s as the predominant authority in how the band wants to play on stage.

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Parliament Funkadelic is an incredible band. They’re definitely one of the bands that have a great deal of influence on how we want to portray ourselves, Special J said. You can’t help but watch them and see how incredible they look when you see their old shows.

The more extravagant and space-aged stage antics of Pariament Funkadelic may not be present in any 2 Skinnee J’s performances because of financial constrictions, but the will to excite the audience is still there.

We’re not quite at the Mother Ship budget. The Mother Ship is still out of our price range, but the Cousin Ship every once in a while shows up, Special J said.

The band is set to release its debut album April 14 and the first single will hit the airwaves in March.

2 Skinnee J’s may be getting on the ball for a big year with the new album, but the one thing they can’t seem to get away from is how often the name of the band is misinterpreted. The singers insist the name is and never was intended to be a drug reference, but the band still gets the usual fans who think the title is referring to a thinly rolled doobie and twist it around.

If we had video footage of everyone saying the six second phrase two fat Js,’ we’d probably have four hours of footage, J Guevera said. We could release a home video.

Special J said he feels the home video package could be expanded a little further with people distorting the name for holiday events.

For an extra $9.95, he said. We could send the bonus 10 minutes of footage of people dressed up on Halloween as two fat Js.’

FACTOID:Big Ass Truck will open the show around 10 p.m. Tickets for the show are $10 in advance and $12 on the day of the show. For information, call 549-2319.