MUSIC : Message Is Loud and Fast When Reverend Heat Takes the Pulpit : The long-touring rockabilly band brings it’s hard-driving brand of music to Santa Barbara on Friday.

Play a Carl Perkins album at 78 r.p.m. on-board an SST, then set the plane on fire. That pretty much describes the Reverend Horton Heat’s approach to rockabilly music. Survivors will be handing out elbows for Christmas presents in the mosh pit at the Friday night show at the Underground in Santa Barbara.

The band started off as a pure rockabilly outfit in 1987, but soon began picking up speed like a tornado roaring across East Texas.

The band tours relentlessly, doing over 200 gigs per year, including side trips to Europe, Australia and anywhere else that will have them. The band is: Jim Heath (the Reverend) playing fast guitar, Jimbo Wallace keeping up on bass, and Patrick (Taz) Bailey backing it up on drums.

The band released a couple of albums on Seattle’s Sub Pop label, but the new one, “Liquor in the Front,” is on Interscope. The songs touch upon the usual topics--sin, sex, substance abuse and surf. “I Can’t Surf” croons the Reverend, not a surprising confession for a Texan. The Reverend made further revelations during a phone interview.

You could’ve been an admiral, a senator, even the Pope, but why a Reverend?

There used to be this club owner who used to give everybody nicknames, and he started calling me “Horton.” At the time, I lived in this old place with a bunch of big old rats. So one night this guy tells me I can have a gig at his place if he can call me “Horton Heat.” My name is Heath, so he just dropped the “h,” but I would’ve done anything--I was living with a bunch of rats. Hey man, I would’ve gotten “Horton Heat” tattooed on my forehead; besides, he already had the posters printed up with “Rev. Horton Heat” on them. After that, I started getting wild on stage, sermonizing and all that.

What’s the difference going from a small label to a big label?

To us, it doesn’t really matter. We play a lot, we tour a lot, but they can handle things and it seems like there’s a Warner Bros. person in every town on the planet. I’m doing a lot more interviews now, like this one for The Times.

Is rockabilly about as popular as it was in the ‘50s?

It’s getting bigger--maybe because of us--I don’t know. Rockabilly was the first punk rock music. There was nothing crazier and more punk rock than Jerry Lee Lewis in the mid- and late-’50s. It’s just loud and fast. It goes. That’s what people want--they want to be entertained.

Do the punkers and the country-Western crowd get along in the pit?

Sometimes they do; sometimes they don’t. At one of our gigs at Bogart’s in Long Beach, they didn’t. First, about 40 couples started line dancing, then all these sweaty guys started crashing into these girls wearing red petticoats, and at least three unrelated fights broke out immediately. But like I said, rockabilly was the original punk rock music.

So you’ve been everywhere, even to Russia--what was that like?

We were playing in Norway and they took us across the border to Russia, way up there in the Arctic Circle. There were a bunch of English bands there, too, but there wasn’t a hotel in the town, so they put us up in the local sanitarium. The staff was all these big Russian women wearing white uniforms saying stuff to us we couldn’t understand.

What did you listen to growing up in Texas?

I listened to a whole lot of different stuff. I’ve played in a lot of different bands--heavy metal bands, punk rock bands and rockabilly bands. What got me started was this record store guy who turned me onto ‘50s music. My first gig was with a ‘50s band, and I’ll always love that music. We have a ‘50s point-of-view, but we’re not a ‘50s band. Rockabilly fans tell me we’re the only speed metal band they can listen to. Then punk rockers tell me I’m the best rockabilly band around.

What keeps you sane on those endless road trips?

Clean socks.

OK, Jim, thanks for talking. I look forward to seeing you in Santa Barbara.

Santa Barbara? I thought this was for the L.A. Times?

It is. We’re like Warner Bros., man.

Details

* WHAT: The Reverend Horton Heat, Useless Playboys, Dave & Deke Combo.

* WHEN: Friday, 9 p.m.

* WHERE: Underground, 110 Santa Barbara St., Santa Barbara.

* HOW MUCH: $12.

* CALL: 965-5050.