The following things already can be said conclusively about 1999. There is entirely too much football. There is entirely too much snow. There aren’t nearly enough surf-rock bands wearing Mexican wrestling masks.
The good news is that this last category at least includes Los Straitjackets, who drew a near-capacity crowd to the Empty Bottle Friday night for a giddy wonder of a set in the brief period between bowl games and blizzard.
Technically, the instrumental quartet hails from Nashville, but they more properly occupy the realm of playful imagination with their colorfully patterned masks, sun-god medallions and matching black outfits, plus band leader Danny Amis’ rapid-fire stage patter en Espanol (“muchas gracias, amigos, muchas gracias”).
With its B-movie vision of beach life, surf music similarly belongs as much to fantasy as it does to actual places, and Los Straitjackets easily turned the landlocked, winterbound club into an idyll of sun, salt and sand with their rendition of Santo and Johnny’s dreamy classic “Sleepwalk.” They paid tribute to surf guitar hero Link Wray as well, covering Wray’s “Branded,” its dark, growling melody set to a swaggering beat.
Los Straitjackets upheld those songs’ tradition with original material from their first two records and many “una cancion nuevo.” Taken either at a dreamlike pace or with roller coaster velocity, the songs followed the progress of one or two simple melodies over several octaves, punctuating them with dramatic breaks and riotous solos.
Herculean drummer Jimmy Lester gave the music an irresistible backbeat with his splashing cymbals, walloping tom-toms and thunderous kick drum. Pete Curry supported him with throbbing bass lines, particularly as he fueled the Godzilla-size groove of “Caveman.”
Amis and fellow guitarist-songwriter Eddie Angel alternated catchy leads with ringing chords, as Angel gave “University Blvd.” a grand, romantic melody and Amis filled “Tailspin” with flamenco-style flurries. Whatever the tempo, the music was dramatic, thanks both to its stop-on-a-dime dynamics and a heavy use of echo affects (in technical terms, “mucho reverb”) that would have made Duane Eddy proud.
While the gorgeous “Pacifica” demonstrated their musical seriousness, Los Straitjackets also scored high for silly fun, shaking their heads in unison to Lester’s walloping beat, waving their guitars in tandem, and ending songs holding their instruments above their heads in championship poses. They made their guitars squawk and cluck on “Itchy Chicken” and paid tribute to a fellow masked superhero with the “Batman” theme.
This clowning around got a little out of hand on a few occasions, particularly the rendition of Celine Dion’s “Titanic” weeper “My Heart Will Go On.” Los Straitjackets recognize, though, that in a irony-addicted era, the only way to revive the carefree delights of vintage rock and roll is to make them an outright hoot.
Chicago’s Crown Royals also are an instrumental quartet that emulates a bygone era’s music, in this case James Brown’s sweaty, saxophone-drenched late-’60s funk. Swanked out in vintage suits and skinny ties, they previewed songs from their second record, due next month, during their opening set.
Jeff BBQ’s tumbling, shuffling drum work and Mark Blade’s thick bass lines pushed and prodded the beat rather than nailing it down. Pete Nathan played biting chicken-scratch guitar riffs while saxophonist Ken Vandermark honked and blared through the grooves’ empty spaces.
The music suggested the soundtrack for car rides, pool games, and waterbed romps, but after a while it called out for a brighter voice to cut through the atmosphere of smoke and sweat.
