They’re Rancid, Not Spoiled : They have major labels calling. Their fans worship them. But somehow these guys are staying true to their punk roots.

When Tim Arm strong, singer for the Berkeley punk band Rancid, was told by Joe Strummer’s manager that Rancid was the former Clash singer’s favorite band, Armstrong’s legs almost gave out beneath him.

Similarly, when Rancid bassist Matt Freeman met John Doe of the group X last year, he could do nothing but stammer.

And when Rancid guitarist Lars Frederiksen was given KISS leader Gene Simmons’ phone number by a mutual friend, he called but hung up in fear as soon as his idol said hello.

These are iconoclastic punks?

Sitting in their manager’s Laguna Beach office on a sunny afternoon, they look the part, with their assorted tattoos, Mohawk haircuts and torn clothes. But the sheepish smiles that accompany their tales of apoplexy confirm that even they find their confessions a bit inconsistent with their punk philosophy.

“One of the things about punk rock is the breakdown of the boundaries of the heroes and star worship,” says Frederiksen, 24, his pink Mohawk emerging from behind a puff of cigarette smoke, delivered from a hand with the letters P-U-N-K tattooed across the knuckles.

And how about when Rancid is on the receiving end of fan worship? So far, the group has been able to avoid much of that. But probably not for long. The early reception of its just-released third album, “ . . . And Out Come the Wolves,” an explosive, thoughtful mix of Clash-like punk and ska, is a strong indication that Rancid is poised to follow Green Day and Offspring into the neo-punk sales stratosphere.

“There was a lot of anticipation for this album,” says Lisa Worden, music director of L.A. radio station KROQ-FM. “With Green Day now all over MTV and the mainstream, Rancid is the cool band. All the cool kids are wearing Rancid T-shirts.”

Other evidence of Rancid’s threshold status includes the 1994 album “Let’s Go,” which reached impressive sales of more than 300,000. And there was also the pack of executives from major labels that hounded the band at every opportunity late last year until the group finally said enough, turning down a reported $1.5-million offer from Epic Records to stay with Hollywood independent Epitaph.

Still, Armstrong, Freeman, Frederiksen and drummer Brett Reed feel immune to most trappings of stardom--though the band had a prime vantage point for watching the effects of success on close friends, having come from the same East Bay club scene as Green Day and having toured the United States as Offspring’s opening act.

“Right now [those bands] are in the middle of a tornado,” says Freeman, 29, his expression turning contemplative under his porkpie hat. “I don’t know. . . . Sometimes I wonder about how [Green Day singer] Billie Joe is doing with all that.”

Adds Armstrong, also 29, who as singer is Rancid’s primary concert focus: “It’s pretty hard for them, Green Day more than Offspring. Billie’s so out there [in the public eye]. All those guys are pretty humble. None of them I don’t think went out to be rock stars. It’s kind of like they stumbled on the whole thing, like we did.”

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Stumble is the perfect word for how Armstrong started Rancid in 1991. In the late ‘80s he and Freeman, who grew up as close friends in the East Bay community of Albany, had been the mainstays of Operation Ivy, a now-legendary Berkeley punk band. But on the verge of national recognition, the band shattered, thanks largely to Armstrong’s destructive habits.

“I was really [messing] up,” says the singer, the hair that on stage is often fashioned into tall, pointy spikes now resting at ease under a backward baseball cap. “I couldn’t hold anything together, like a job or a band. After Operation Ivy I was drinking really hard and doing drugs and really [screwing] up. I ended up going to these detox houses in Richmond, and I’d get off the drink and get sober and then go out and drink some more, spent all my money, making everybody mad and not having a place to stay.

“I ended up in the Salvation Army, the last bottom line. I lived there, they gave me a bed, and I’d get up in the morning and work there all day.”

That proved to be what he needed, and in August, 1991, clean and sober, Armstrong approached Freeman about re-teaming. The two began writing songs and with Reed, now 23, formed Rancid, later to be joined by Frederiksen. Epitaph owner Brett Gurewitz, an Operation Ivy fan, signed Rancid without hearing a note, and the label released the band’s debut in 1993, followed last year by “Let’s Go.”

T his time Armstrong was on a mission.

“I don’t know why I’m [screwed] up,” says Armstrong, who traces his problems to an impoverished childhood with an alcoholic father. “But I tell you, when I’ve got a dream, like playing music, I’ve got a reason to be here. It’s exciting. I haven’t drank or done any drugs since I got out of the Salvation Army. I don’t want to go back to that. I don’t ever want to go back to that. It’s not romantic. It’s [expletive] lame. But if I didn’t have the band as that outlet and that dream, I wouldn’t be here.”

That’s reflected in the new album’s mix of personal tales and character studies about trying to rise above bad circumstances, all delivered with Clash-like fervor. The one that Armstrong says means the most to him is “Daly City Train,” about a friend of his who did not survive:

He’s shooting dope in the men’s room at the station

Daly City Train

Have you ever seen an angel, well I know I have

They’ll stay here for a while then they fly away

But just because he’s survived, don’t expect Armstrong to stand as a role model for troubled youth.

“I’ll tell you what happened to me and write songs about my friends, but I ain’t no [expletive] role model--how could I be?” he says. “You want to get anything good out of that, God bless you, and I’ll write songs and you can listen to them. . . . I don’t think drinking’s bad. I don’t think drugs are bad. I just think if you’re gonna die from it, you might want to stop. Just look what I did and look at me now. If you like what you see, cool. Or you might think I’m an idiot.”

E ven Armstrong’s mother won dered if he was an idiot last December when the band turned down the Epic offer.

“My mom freaked out,” Armstrong says. “She didn’t get it. I’m like, ‘Mom, it’s not about money. It’s about respect for the band, you know, ‘cause this is what I do. I love my band so much.’ She’s like, ‘What kind of thinking is that?’ I’m like, ‘I got this way of thinking from you!’ She’d never [cared] about money. It was always more about family and friends. She understands now.”

Rancid had been courted by a number of labels--Madonna herself came to the band’s dressing room in New York on behalf of her Maverick Records company. Most of the record executives didn’t impress the band much.

The one who tempted the group was Michael Goldstone, vice president of artists and repertoire at Epic Records, who brought Pearl Jam to the company. Goldstone had been a Rancid fan long before the others and truly understood the group and its music.

“He’s really nice, honest, you could tell that he’s a stand-up guy who would go to bat for his bands. . . ,” Armstrong says. “And we were feeling kind of like an unwanted stepchild [at Epitaph] because things blew up for them so quick, it was like the whole staff there was overwhelmed. Our last record came out a month after the Offspring record, and we didn’t get any attention.”

With all that, it looked like a deal with Epic was done. The band even went over to Goldstone’s Manhattan apartment and dyed the executive’s hair blue in honor of his friendship. But as word got out about the proposed signing, Rancid had second thoughts amid a hubbub of accusations from friends and fans that big label equates to sellout .

Epitaph couldn’t match Epic’s multinational money, but Gurewitz did come through with the currency the band needed to make it stay.

“Brett told us that he loved us, and that was all we really needed to hear,” Frederiksen says. “I think it was a spiritual move for us to stay on Epitaph.”

D oes that mean they’ve forgone a chance at megabucks? No, says manager Jim Guerinot, who started working with the band soon after it decided to stay with the indie. After all, he also manages Offspring, which has sold millions through Epitaph. In fact, he says, the danger is in setting sights too high.

“Green Day and Offspring are aberrations,” Guerinot says. “No one knows why it happened for them. I loved when Nirvana broke, the people at Geffen said, ‘We don’t know what happened, but we tried to maximize it.’ That’s very astute. What Rancid has to do is go out and be the best Rancid they can. That means our goal is simply to do better than the last record.”

Armstrong believes that the group already has.

“I don’t know how much we can sell or whatever,” he says. “But the record’s really solid and we put a lot into it. Whatever happens, I know we played hard on the record. We wrote a lot of really good songs. And all our friends are [expletive] excited about it. I play it for people I really care about and they’re like, ‘Dude, this is [expletive] cool [expletive].’ That’s a good feeling right there.”*