POP : Little Feat on the Ground at Coach House

When a rock band gets into a funky, chunky easy-rolling groove that conjures up a New Orleans Mardi Gras celebration, it invariably evokes comparisons to Little Feat.

With its loose-limbed rhythms (which only come off with the proper offhanded ease if the players are exceptionally tight), its lubricated lurch of boozy slide guitars, and its drawling vocals, Little Feat can claim ownership of a signature sound.

The band started coming together in 1969, when guitarist Lowell George, who had been playing in Frank Zappa’s Mothers of Invention, hooked up with piano player Bill Payne. With the addition of drummer Richie Hayward and bassist Roy Estrada, they developed a sound steeped in Southern tradition. Based in Los Angeles, Little Feat was capable of direct warmth, but it also displayed a streak of wry absurdism befitting a band that included an ex-Mother.

Little Feat’s 1971 debut album echoed the Band in its exploration of traditional musical Americana. By its third album, “Dixie Chicken,” which featured the arrival of a second guitarist, Paul Barrere, a new bassist, Kenny Gradney, and a second percussionist, Sam Clayton, Little Feat was firmly into that signature funky groove.

In the mid-’70s, Little Feat became a cult band on the edge of mainstream popularity, scoring a couple of gold albums and a series of FM radio favorites such as “Willin’,” “Sailin’ Shoes,” “Dixie Chicken” and “All That You Dream.”

In 1979, George embarked on a solo career, then died of a heart attack.

In 1988, the five surviving Little Feat alumni regrouped, with George’s considerable role apportioned between two new additions: guitarist Fred Tackett, who had sat in on and contributed songs to earlier Little Feat albums, and singer Craig Fuller, a former member of Pure Prairie League.

Little Feat’s comeback album, “Let It Roll,” was a commercial success that re-established the band’s old sound with a bit of contemporary polish dabbed on.

The group’s 1990 release, “Representing the Mambo,” was a less-inspired detour away from basic rootsy music into a more urbane pop style that suffered from diffuse songwriting. Last year, after leaving its longtime record company, Warner Bros., Little Feat returned on the new Morgan Creek label with “Shake Me Up,” a solid return to form, with plenty of those lurching rhythms, some revving rockers, and a couple of warm, soulful ballads that would be right up Bonnie Raitt’s alley. Little Feat’s old juxtaposition of earthiness and oddity still comes out: few other bands could be expertly funky but also use the word paradigm in a chorus.

Little Feat’s three-night, five-show stand at the Coach House is being billed as an acoustic performance, which figures to put an emphasis on those earthier delights.

Who: Little Feat.

When: Thursday, April 23, at 8 p.m.; Friday and Saturday, April 24 and 25, at 8 and 10:30 p.m.

Where: The Coach House, 33157 Camino Capistrano, San Juan Capistrano.

Whereabouts: San Diego Freeway to the San Juan Creek Road exit. Left onto Camino Capistrano. The Coach House is in the Esplanade Plaza.

Wherewithal: $32.50 (April 24 early show and both April 25 shows are sold out).

Where to Call: (714) 496-8930.