POP MUSIC REVIEW : Huey Lewis & the News: The Same Old Story

Memo to Huey Lewis: In the news business, late delivery is a sure way to lose subscribers. It wasn’t until the last quarter of a nearly two-hour show Thursday at the Coach House that Lewis and band offered any news worth hearing.

But then, Huey Lewis & the News already has lost much of the fan base that, in one of the most unlikely developments in pop history, turned this unremarkable Bay Area bar band into an ‘80s arena attraction able to score three consecutive platinum albums from 1983 to 1988.

By rights, an utterly mediocre performance like the one Lewis and company gave during most of their show should weaken whatever following remains.

At $45 a ticket, Lewis’ sold-out stand at the Coach House, which also included two scheduled performances Friday night, was the most expensive attraction the Coach House has presented in nine years as a concert club, not counting special New Year’s Eve packages.

That means at least 1,500 fans in Orange County still highly value Lewis & the News despite the band’s decline in popularity over the past five years. The fans’ adoring response suggested that these were hard-core Huey lovers who probably wouldn’t abandon their nice-guy hero unless he began acting like the vampire Lestat.

Actually, Lewis’ singing voice, never anything special, sounded as if it had been sucked dry of whatever juice it once had. In a show that alternated between his R & B-flavored pop hits and the straight-on soul and jump-blues featured on his most recent album, the all-oldies covers collection, “Four Chords & Several Years Ago,” Lewis was hopelessly overmatched by the tradition’s vocal demands.

*

His husky voice couldn’t reach a high note, much less sustain one. The decorations, intensifiers and free flights that allow expert soul singers to stir up the emotions or simply convey a sense of musical zest were beyond his grasp.

All that remained were the feeble cries he substituted for high notes and grunted “unhs” that evidently were supposed to mean he was really putting his muscles into it.

Expressiveness is possible without a great voice if a singer can somehow make the feelings and characters in a song believable. But Lewis sells a lyric the way Orange County is going to sell what’s left of its investment portfolio: at a deep, deep discount.

“She Shot a Hole in My Soul,” a brassy soul oldie drawn from Lewis’ current album, could have been a mini-drama with moments wry, plaintive and caustic. Instead, it came across with the pastel amiableness that is the only shade of feeling Lewis offers.

At least, one figured, an experienced instrumental outfit like the News would be able to keep the music sharp and the energy pumping (four of the five core members have been with Lewis since the band began in 1979).

*

Instead, for more than an hour, they failed to muster the energy and enthusiasm that you’d demand from a professional bar band whose members play for $45 a night, let alone one that commands $45 a ticket.

“Normally we don’t play smaller venues, but I think it’s the best place to see somebody play,” Lewis noted at one point. He and his band didn’t exactly seize the opportunity to blow out the joint and prove that they’ve still got arena-scale heat in them.

No soloist stepped forward to ignite the show; guitarist Chris Hayes, the player who had the most opportunities, was strictly routine. His hurried, thin-toned blues soloing at the end of “She Don’t Know” was a particularly ill-conceived and inexpressive capper to a sweet-soul number that called for something much sweeter and far more soulful.

After a while, it became apparent that background singers Conesha Owens and Sandy Griffith were the most potent musical force in Lewis’ 11-member ensemble, which included, besides the five News men, a spare keyboards player and a sometimes-punchy three-man horn section.

It wasn’t until the last song before encores, the R & B oldie “Better to Have and Not Need,” that the female vocal duo’s bright voices and lively stage presence finally were featured. Sure enough, it was the first song of the evening on which the band played with some ensemble spark.

That belatedly discovered spirit carried over into most of the encore. On an urgent and boisterous reading of the Sam & Dave nugget “I Thank You,” Owens and Griffith took over and made the most of the spotlight, pushing Lewis into the background.

*

During the surging blues shuffle “Bad Is Bad,” the band seemed to take inspiration from a cool, jazz-tinged tenor-sax solo by Ron Stallings that created one of the concert’s few unpredictable moments of playful possibility. And on the rocking closer, “Workin’ for a Livin,’ ” the entire band, Lewis included, finally began to sound as free and vibrant as it should have all along.

At $45 a pop--a pretty healthy livin’ to be workin’ for--Lewis & the News should not have been an hour-and-a-half late in delivering.

By the way, fans interested in hearing a young blues, soul and R & B band that has hunger, fire, and a front man worthy of his classic-soul influences can check out Barrelhouse, playing tonight and each Sunday in January at the Heritage Brewing Co. in Dana Point.

Playing for a $5 door charge, Barrelhouse is virtually certain to put out more passion and excitement than Lewis & the News did at a record-setting price.