Ex-Motels’ Martha Davis Checks in as ‘Grunge Grandma’

Martha Davis, the sultry-voiced former leader of the Motels, seems to stand a better chance than most for a successful second life in music.

First, she was sought out by promoters for a new tour rather than the reverse, eradicating the brand of desperation that often accompanies such comeback attempts.

Second, Davis intends to completely rewrite her musical methods from her days with the glossy Motels, going for the throat with a smaller, more aggressive, guitar-driven band.

Most important, Davis has a wonderfully pointed sense of humor, and thus possesses an innate wisdom about herself and her motivations. The lady is no one’s fool.

Close to a decade after the breakup of the Motels, Davis--who performs Sunday night at the Coach House--also brings a mature perspective to the table. She returns to the public eye at age 43 as a grandmother, a fact that she is quick to acknowledge and laugh about rather than cover up like some dark, career-killing secret.

A pregnant Air Force wife at age 15, Davis had extricated herself from that ill-advised union by the time she was of legal age, determined to lead a more creative existence.

“I had this vision of myself somewhere down the line wearing fluffy slippers and rollers in my hair, a beer in one hand and a box of chocolates in the other,” Davis said with a characteristic laugh in a recent phone interview from her Ventura home. “I saw this image, and I went, ‘Aaaahhhhh!!’ ”

After her divorce, Davis became a folk singer for a time. In 1971 she started the group that eventually would become the Motels. Signed to Capitol Records eight years later, the Motels were among the first of the Los Angeles-based “new wave” groups to score a record deal, and one of the most successful.

After endless touring and a few minor hits, the Motels struck gold with their third album, 1982’s “All Four One,” which included the career-defining single, “Only the Lonely.”

The group remained a charting, theater-filling attraction for the next few years, but Davis, the lead singer and principal songwriter, had grown bored with the group, which broke up in 1986.

She released a solo album the following year; it failed to generate much interest, and Davis faded into the background.

“I was fed up with the business,” she said. “I’d been at it since 1971, hammering away. Even though it took eight years to get signed, it all seemed to happen so fast that I was impressionable and slightly malleable. As the record company made decisions, I ended up becoming something that wasn’t necessarily what I started out to be, or wanted to be. The Motels, when we first started, were a very wild little unit, and as time passed, I think we became more polished and corporate and produced.

“I haven’t yet made an album that I can listen to,” she added, with more laughter. “I ended up succumbing to the powers-that-be. It was like, ‘You should sound more like Heart, you should do this, you should do that.’

“I can’t blame anyone but myself, because I went along with the program,” she said. “But at some point, it wasn’t funny anymore, and if you can’t laugh in this business, then forget it.”

After retiring from performing, Davis continued to write songs, and has written film scores for a pair of unreleased movies by son-in-law Chris Matheson, co-writer of “Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure,” in which Davis also cadged a cameo appearance.

Davis’ seclusion was recently ended by Nikki Sweet, marketing director and assistant talent buyer for the Coach House, Ventura Theatre and Folgner Management.

“I wasn’t even thinking about performing, but (Sweet) called me up one day, and she was a real bloodhound,” Davis said. “I’d moved and changed my number a bunch of times, but she found me. She wanted me to play some gig in San Diego, but I didn’t even have a band at the time. But I kind of went, ‘Dang it, it’s time. I’m gonna put together a band.’

“Nikki, right now, is like responsible for my career. She said the right thing to me at the right time, and I said, ‘Yeah! Let’s go play!’ She’s real excited about me getting back to work,” she said.

With Sweet handling her comeback, Davis has a handful of concerts booked throughout Southern California in the next few weeks. She’s testing the waters, for now not thinking about record deals or national tours.

Still, Davis was serious-minded, even as she seemed to feel caught up in a strange left turn recently dealt out by the Fates. Her musical vision is finely honed, and it’s a different sound from the Motels she’s after this time around--”edgy, stripped down and bare bones,” as she describes it. “I’m going to be the grunge grandma.”

“The spirit of music right now is very reminiscent to me of when the Motels first started out, because we came in riding that ‘new wave,’ as they called it, which came in right after punk had shaken up the whole music scene,” Davis said.

“Before that, it was pretty much Eagles-Linda Ronstadt-mellow California. Basically, that’s where music is at again. The grunge and alternative stuff is like, ‘OK, we’re tired of Madonna.’ It feels just like the good old days.”

* Martha Davis and the Glory Holes perform Sunday at the Coach House, 33157 Camino Capistrano in San Juan Capistrano. 8 p.m. $19.50. (714) 496-8930.