Honky-Tonk Cantina

It’s a Saturday night at Viva Fresh, an ivy-festooned Mexican restaurant, paces west of Burbank’s Equestrian Center, and the room is alive with bustling waiters and conversation.

Then, Rick Shea and his trio, The Losin’ End, set up their amps and begin to play.

“An empty bottle, a broken heart, and you’re still on my mind,” sings Shea, in a voice rich with restrained heartache, backing up the George Jones chestnut with electric guitar licks that eloquently echo honky-tonk’s Golden Age.

A couple of newcomers look up from their plates. Country music at a Mexican restaurant?

To Shea, a frequent traveler on the country scene who drives in from Covina two Saturdays a month (and some Thursdays) to perform here, it’s an easy connection.

“A lot of people come over from the nighttime rides,” Shea said. “It’s got that Austin, Texas, vibe--a Mexican restaurant with rootsy country music. It’s one of the non-formula country places still around.”

Shea is just one of several traditional country acts--not a “hits” band among them--quietly turning Viva Fresh into a Texas-style honky-tonk six nights a week, including the Cody Bryant Trio on Wednesdays and Fridays and instrumental maven Tom Sauber, who alternates with Craig Eastman and former Dwight Yoakam fiddler Brantley Kearns on Thursday “Fiddle Nights.”

On this occasion, Shea and company (which includes veteran bassist Dave Hall and John White, onetime drummer for Hoyt Axton and Jackson Browne) careen through a jaw-dropping array of musical Americana, ranging from a bluesy Jimmie Rodgers tune to Bob Wills’ western swing, an original Tex-Mex shuffle, a Cajun rocker and a hefty dose of jukebox classics a la Ray Price and other country kings--all played with style, grace and no hip gyrations.

Shea, 44, who grew up in San Bernardino, earned his eclecticism over nearly 20 years on Southern California’s wide-ranging country circuit, starting in the late ‘70s when he played Grateful Dead, Flying Burrito Brothers and Neil Young songs at local lounges.

“Then, I fell into playing these truck stop country bars and you had to learn all the Merle Haggard and George Jones tunes. That’s when I started putting in a lot of time with country,” said the soft-spoken Shea, who also taught himself to play the pedal steel guitar.

Through the ‘80s, as an in-demand sideman and while fronting his own bands, Shea played neon-lit lounges from San Diego to Orange County (“I don’t think there’s one of those places I haven’t played,” he said).

That trip began to wind down, however, with the advent of the ‘90s line-dance craze.

“That made it tougher and tougher for me,” admitted Shea. “When you think about it, Bob Wills was a dance band--it’s a tradition in country. But I was used to making some sort of emotional connection to people with my songs, and, basically, now they just wanted songs they could line-dance to.”

These days, Shea is moving in new directions--largely limiting his sideman stints to recording and touring with tradition-oriented acts like ex-Blaster Dave Alvin and Heather Myles.

As an artist, his appearance on “A Town South of Bakersfield” (a 1991 L.A. compilation series that also featured Dwight Yoakam and Lucinda Williams) gained him notice with a slyly humorous rockabilly tune, “A Foot in the Fire.”

Better yet, his 1995 album, “The Buffalo Show” (on tiny Major Label Recordings), climbed to No. 24 on the Americana charts, garnering critical raves for a slew of lyrically evocative Appalachian and Old West folk ballads--many of which still receive airplay.

None of which has resulted in the wider audience he aspires to, although a recent showcase for a major label gives him hope.

“But if nothing pans out, we’ll just do it ourselves,” he said.

In the meantime, he plays places like McCabe’s Guitar Shop, Jack’s Sugar Shack in Hollywood (new bastion for the old Palomino crowd) and here, where “nobody has anything to say about what we do.”

The night has progressed, the crowd thinned and the band has downshifted into lower gear, segueing from a jazzy “Corinna, Corinna,” to a solemn Merle Haggard lament, “I Threw Away the Rose.”

As sidekick Brantley Kearns joins the group onstage, Shea’s own “Sycamore Grove”--an enchantingly fiddle-edged ballad with harmonies--sweeps over the room.

“Play some Hank!” someone yells from the floor.

No problem at all.

BE THERE

Rick Shea and the Losin’ End at Viva Fresh, 900 Riverside Drive, Burbank. 9-11 p.m. Saturday and Sunday and with Brantley Kearns on “Fiddle Night,” Thursday, June 4. (818) 845-2425.