Dressed Up, Ready to Lounge

Well-poured martinis sparkle under soft lights. Lazy smoke and happy chatter drift through the room. Onstage, sharp cats in swanky matching tuxes are cooking up some way-out sounds, daring the collected revelers to follow the music’s nutty lead. Young swingers fill the dance floor, hungry for more of that cool, crazy beat.

No, it’s not visions of some long-forgotten shindig at Hef’s place. The old-school drinks, vintage threads and retro sounds are beginning to show up in today’s rock clubs, as a few dedicated bands rediscover the high style and happy hour vibe of late-’50s and early-’60s cocktail music.

Such bands as Love Jones, Combustible Edison and the Swamp Zombies have turned their amps down and dressed themselves up as they explore America’s golden era of suburban cool. At their shows, they attempt to create a small, cozy world in which cocktail-sipping takes precedence over moshing and velvet has supplanted flannel as the fabric of choice. Never mind the grunge--welcome to lounge.

“I think everybody wants to enjoy that playboy, high-life image, even if it’s just for a few moments at a show,” says Jonathan Palmer, vocalist of the Kentucky-bred, L.A.-based Love Jones, which plays Thursday at the Derby in the Los Feliz district (in lounge tradition, there’s no cover charge). “It’s a nice feeling to have a European cigarette in one hand and a well-poured cocktail in the other. People’s everyday lives are more everyday than ever, so temporary fantasy living is at a premium right now.”

On its recent debut album for Zoo Records, “Here’s to the Losers,” Love Jones lays tight harmonies over gentle R&B; grooves cut through with some soul, pop and smoky jazz. For performances, the band dons custom-made, 100%-polyester suits and kicks up the energy of the music with a healthy dose of smarmy banter and playful audience interaction.

Most of today’s young lounge aficionados discovered the sounds they are reinterpreting while rummaging through their parents’ record collections. These nascent rockers-cum-loungers found themselves secretly cherishing the stylish “exotica” of Martin Denny, the bachelor-pad kick of Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass and the dramatic swing of Henry Mancini.

“Even when I was a punk rocker who just wanted to get hit by a truck, I’d come home and calm down by listening to my parents’ records,” says Love Jones vocalist and conga player Ben Daughtrey.

The new lounge sound is a smooth distillation of diverse influences, from the jumping jive of Louis Jordan to the Fellini film scores of Nino Rota and the cabaret songs of Kurt Weill. There are some less distinguished lounge heroes as well.

“It’d be dishonest not to admit that Bill Murray’s lounge singer was an influence,” Daughtrey says with a laugh. “But we do take our music seriously. I just think too many people at clubs don’t even have the word fun in their vocabulary anymore. You’re supposed to be cool by being dull and depressed. We live in an era of non-romance and non-beauty, and I’m nostalgic for the aesthetic and romantic quality that the lounge era offered.”

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Rhode Island’s Combustible Edison has brought some glamorous sparkle to the ultra-grungy Sub Pop label with the release of its debut, “I, Swinger.” Guitarist Michael (The Millionaire) Cudahy, a self-described ex-punk, says that the desire to be swank and suave rather than fast and loud is no joke. The group’s repertoire ranges from “Cry Me a River,” the old Julie London hit, to Weill’s “Surabaya Johnny.”

“I don’t like to see cocktail music done as a gag or as shtick,” he says. “It’s fun music, but it’s not stupid. Our band doesn’t go for kitsch value.”

Cudahy hopes that Combustible Edison, which plays June 12 at Jacks Sugar Shack, can help to create a Cocktail Nation, a network of well-heeled swingers who will continue to create and appreciate cocktail music in appropriately loungey settings.

“Rock clubs are the worst places to socialize. They’re not very good places to hear music--and forget about getting a decent drink,” he says. “I still like rock music, but it’s been done, done, done. It communicates the id well--I’m hungry, I’m horny, I’m angry. But lounge music has more color. It covers a wider spectrum. Frankly, I think putting on my tux is the most punk rock thing I’ve ever done.”

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These former punks aren’t the first rockers to find solace in a world of dry martinis and brassy beats. David Johansen, lead singer for the seminal ‘70s glam-punks the New York Dolls, developed the loungey alter ego of Buster Poindexter nearly 10 years ago.

At first, the Poindexter persona simply allowed the singer to kick back and cut loose in smaller New York clubs, but it also scored him a hit in 1987 with an over-the-top take of “Hot Hot Hot.” Johansen can currently be seen in character on the lounge-happy variety show “Buster’s Happy Hour,” airing Friday nights on VH-1.

Steeve Jacobs of Orange County’s Swamp Zombies says the lounge scene offers him and his band a chance to investigate their suburban heritage.

“The suburbs can’t get any cooler than lounge,” he says. “The generation of kids whose parents were into this stuff have taken a while to express our roots, but it’s happening. My dad listened to any record that had a picture of a pretty girl in an exotic location--in front of a beaded curtain, next to a volcano. I grew up loving that stuff.”

On the cover of their last record, “Spunk,” the Swamp Zombies are resplendent in smoking jackets and dark shades. Jacobs holds a martini in one hand and a cigarette-in-holder in the other.

He takes pride in the band’s music but says the secret to being a successful lounger is in the cocktails: “You have to stay away from new drinks--Sex on the Beach and so on. Go to a thrift store and find an old mixing glass with recipes listed on the side. Pick one of those to be your drink. It’s just as important for a drink to look good as taste good. Maybe more important.”

The music of Chicago’s Urge Overkill owes more to Cheap Trick than to ‘50s hi-fi heroes like Martin Denny, but the Urge members were early and enthusiastic celebrators of lounge fashion and happy hour panache. Even when they were a struggling outfit touring in their own van and playing very small, very unglamorous venues, they carried customized tuxedo jackets, turtlenecks, vests and medallions in their wardrobe. These days, the band occasionally dresses down to keep the music from being overshadowed by the clothes. For a recent appearance on “Late Show With David Letterman,” the band played in black jeans and T-shirts.

“We love that Cocktail Nation look and style,” says guitarist Nash Kato. “But we are playing rock music and we want it to speak for itself. We don’t always want to be ‘the band with the jackets.’ Of course, that doesn’t mean we’ve lost our taste for bracing martinis and exciting tiki bars. I’d much rather spend my leisure time in a lounge than in a rock club.”

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The looks and sounds of lounge are spreading into other forms of entertainment as well. At Igby’s comedy club, L.A.-based comedian Rick Corso has put together “Vegarama,” a Vegas-style lounge revue that’s part parody and part homage. And San Francisco crooner Bud E. Luv brings neo-Vegas flamboyance to nightclubs and theaters. At a recent LunaPark performance, he delighted the crowd with post-polyester versions of such classics as “Blowin’ in the Wind,” “Back in Black” and “What’s New, Pussycat?”

L.A. lounge fans often have the choice of taking their music straight or with a twist. At the Dresden, bona fide song stylists Marty & Elayne entertain a hip rock crowd with all manner of pop and jazz standards. Roller-skating cabaret singer Joey Cheezhee has opted for a high-kitsch approach in his zany lounge extravaganzas at Kelbo’s.

Combustible Edison’s Cudahy says the lounge scene’s appeal is in its celebration of personal style.

“ ‘Be fabulous’ is our central credo,” he says. “That implies a visual thing, a certain amount of imagination and a degree of self-respect. To be fabulous means to make yourself into a beautiful freak. That’s what lounge music is about.”

Love Jones’ Palmer agrees. “We’re not trying to reverentially re-create something that happened 30 years ago,” he says. “We’re just trying to entertain with a mix of style and substance. A lot of bands today have pushed away from giving entertainment value, because it’s associated with selling out or phony packaging.

Palmer’s bandmate Daughtrey says he’s happy to be tapping into a musical era that was hipper, happier and better-looking.

“It was a time when hedonism was acceptable. I have a vintage portable bar designed as an attache case for the businessman on the go. That’s an amazing concept these days. What happened to that world of pleasure? There’s way too much guilt going around these days. Love Jones is just trying to bring back a sense of fun, and we want to look good doing it.”*