O.C. POP MUSIC REVIEW : From Blues and Ballads to Burlesque : Rockers Johnette Napolitano and Andy Prieboy put on a likable road show that takes in a wide assortment of songs and plenty of spontaneous humor.

Johnette Napolitano and Andy Prieboy should take their show off the road immediately--and put it in some cozy cabaret, where it could become a running attraction to be savored again and again.

The Concrete Blonde front-woman and the former Wall of Voodoo singer, with help from Wire Train guitarist Jeff Trott, proved Thursday night at the Coach House that alternative rockers (the right ones, anyway) can carry on grandly in the old saloon tradition that requires performers to be amusing, likable company as well as good musicians.

Their 90-minute acoustic set of solo, duo and trio performances was part minimalist variety show and part high-IQ version of “Wayne’s World.” It featured plenty of personality and easy-flowing, spontaneously funny byplay as well as a winning, often surprising assortment of songs ranging from poignant ballads to raunchy Bessie Smith blues to bawdy farce. Above all, it featured Napolitano, who is headlining the 10-city western tour, in all her glory as one of the most sensitive and commanding rock singers around.

Prieboy led off alone at his keyboards, singing in a dryly declamatory style that fell somewhere between Stan Ridgway (Prieboy’s predecessor in Wall of Voodoo) and Warren Zevon. He dug into despair on one hymnal ballad, issuing a plea--”Can you take me to higher ground?”--from depths normally occupied by Tom Waits’ broken gutter denizens. Prieboy showed an actor’s instinct as he dropped in on ritzier precincts in “The New York Debut of an L.A. Artist,” a sardonic, near-manic depiction of art snobs in their element.

Napolitano joined Prieboy for two ballad duets, including his masterpiece of existential rage, “Tomorrow, Wendy.” Her outcry against fate filled the room with reverberating sound carrying palpable anguish.

As forceful as she could be at peak moments as that (and there were many more in the series of Concrete Blonde songs and well-chosen covers of the Replacements, World Party and Queen that followed in her solo segment), Napolitano had the sense to hold back when a song called for it. Singing Paul Westerberg’s wistful ballad “Skyway,” she was withdrawn and fragile, singing almost to herself to maximize the song’s lonely yearning. Later, Napolitano transformed herself into a sassy blues belter for a romping, hip-swaying run through Bessie Smith’s “One Hour Mama.” She generated all the heat you could want in this declaration of female sexual prowess (and demand for equally adept male reciprocity), carrying along the crowd as she swiveled in a skirt and vest outfit that made her look like an uncommonly hip airline stewardess.

Tellingly, Napolitano dug deeper at the end, intoning the song’s last word, need, in a small, plaintive voice--as if to remind us of the vulnerability that underlies sexual desire.

Napolitano, who plays bass in Concrete Blonde, wasn’t the most accurate self-accompanist on guitar--which made Trott, who wore a matador’s vest, a welcome presence when he joined her on guitar and mandolin a few songs into her segment. Though mentioning that Concrete Blonde’s next album, “Walking in London,” is finished and due out in March, Napolitano didn’t give a preview of any new material.

With all of the purely musical points made (and with Prieboy back), it was time to amplify the humor that had been present in frequent asides throughout the show. The stage became like a living room after the fourth round of martinis, with spontaneously generated quips tossed back and forth until it was time for another tune to roll around.

In a closing round of pop burlesque, the tunes tended to be sillier than the quips. Inspired by some satiric banter about the William Kennedy Smith trial, Prieboy sang a hilariously salacious doo-wop ballad (contents thoroughly unprintable), augmented by Napolitano’s interpretive gestures and Frankie Valli falsetto embellishments. More of the same followed in a set-closing Christmas song about a holiday murder rampage, which went: “Shouldn’t have given him a gun for Christmas/Look what daddy has done, done, done.”

Rather than send ‘em home laughing, Napolitano returned for a glowing, emotional encore of the Concrete Blonde hit “Joey” and the Hendrix ballad “Castles Made of Sand.”

After all that, the only bad thing you could say was that, unlike a cabaret act at its steady gig, this engaging cast of characters wouldn’t be back at the same place a week hence.