Horns of Plenty

Roomful of Blues has gone through a houseful of changes in its 30-year history as an astonishingly diverse, eminently danceable all-purpose purveyor of blues, swing, R&B; and old-fashioned rock ‘n’ roll. But the past year brought so much turnover that only a band with a truly durable mission and concept, not to mention a sterling ensemble reputation, could have survived it.

Of the nine members who appeared on the Rhode Island band’s 1997 album, “Under One Roof,” just four remained when Roomful recorded its current release, “There Goes the Neighborhood.” Two more members have left recently, including John Rossi, the veteran drummer who, because of a stomach ailment, had to give up Roomful’s 200-gigs-a-year pace.

Saxophonist Rich Lataille, an original member of Roomful’s acclaimed horn section, has been in the band since 1970, when the more compact lineup founded in 1968 by singer-guitarist Duke Robillard expanded and diversified. Trumpeter Bob Enos has been on the bandstand with Roomful since 1981. Chris Vachon, the guitarist since 1990, is the only other member with more than a year’s tenure.

Over the years, Roomful has witnessed the coming and going of enough talent to stock a respectable independent blues and roots label. Robillard (whose playing stoked several tracks on Bob Dylan’s great modern-blues album, “Time Out of Mind”) and Ronnie Earl are highly regarded guitarist-bandleaders; longtime baritone sax man Doug James now plays in Robillard’s band.

Other graduates with solo albums include singer-saxophonist Greg Piccolo, who took over Roomful’s leadership for many years after Robillard left in the early ‘80s, piano player Ron Levy, trombonist Porky Cohen and singers Lou Ann Barton, Curtis Salgado and Sugar Ray Norcia. The Fabulous Thunderbirds, during their rise in the 1980s, were powered by two Roomful alumni, drummer Fran Christina and bassist Preston Hubbard.

Whole Is Bigger Than the Individual

In separate phone interviews from a hotel in Houston, Lataille, 46, and Vachon, 41, pointed to the band’s ensemble concept and stylistic diversity as the keys to its durability.

Time has proven that there are no irreplaceable cogs in Roomful--and that a network of strong musicians exists who shun the boredom of a single blues approach and are eager to step in when vacancies occur.

“We’ve tried to keep it a band over the years, the whole being much more important than each individual part,” Lataille said. “People have left because they wanted to be the guy, rather than part of the collective unit. If you’re going to play in a band the size we have, you know you have to trade off time in the spotlight for it to work right.”

“I like the diversity,” said Vachon. “A big band, with a nice horn section trading off solos has always been something for me. Hearing the same instrument solo all night, after a while you want to hear something else.”

It might be illuminating for fans of the swing-revivalist craze to spend an evening with Roomful. Hit neo-swing bands such as Royal Crown Revue, Cherry Poppin’ Daddies, Big Bad Voodoo Daddy and the Squirrel Nut Zippers sell a nostalgic look, a retro-hip attitude, and the modest (i1713402984the hands of experts.

With Roomful, which since the ‘70s has incorporated swing rooted in Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Louis Jordan and the Buddy Johnson Orchestra, you subtract the attitude and get the virtuosity.

Roomful isn’t inclined to jump onto a bandwagon that it rode more than 20 years before there was a bandwagon. (In the ‘80s, Roomful made Grammy-nominated collaborative albums with R&B-jazz; legends Big Joe Turner and Eddie “Cleanhead” Vinson, as well as New Orleans R&B; man Earl King; in the greatest vote of confidence a swing band could have, Basie himself became a fan during the ‘70s).

“I love swing music, but I don’t want to depend on that to be our vehicle to success,” Lataille said. “We don’t consider ourselves a swing band. Although we do a couple of Count Basie tunes and stuff like that, we never geared ourselves to be that kind of one-dimensional thing. Obviously we’ve thought about the implications [of the current swing revival], but it would mean changing what we do and focusing on one particular thing.”

Lataille has a passing acquaintance with some of the new swing crop and feels they’re missing the rhythmic dexterity and solo flights to really swing.

“The guys in [those] bands are alternative musicians and they just decided to try something different,” he said. “I’m not really bothered by it. If it gets people to listen to Count Basie and Duke Ellington, it can’t do anything but good.

“People with discerning taste will figure out where the good stuff is and where the bad stuff is. I wouldn’t be honest if I said I didn’t wish I made the kind of money [the new crop of hit swing bands] make. Being in Roomful has always been a struggle financially because we have a lot of people and you have to spread it around. That’s why we have to work so much and can’t take a lot of time off; we have too much overhead.”

At Last, Graduation to a Proper Touring Bus

Keeping expenses down has been as much a Roomful tradition as its four-member horn section and its lineage of hot guitar players. For many years, the band members toured by cramming themselves into a converted library bookmobile. They moved up to a refitted airport shuttle van, then, two years ago, finally acquired a proper touring bus with comfortable bunks, lounge areas and a TV.

Roomful has long been looking for the radio hit that might vault it out of the stamina-taxing club circuit and into a cushier sector of the music business. The band’s new singer, Mac Odom, has a strong soul music background that shows in such cuts as “Backseat Blues,” a catchy, bright number that might appeal to fans of Huey Lewis or Southside Johnny, and “There Goes the Neighborhood,” the sort of taut, nervous blues-R&B; song that has defined Robert Cray’s style.

Norcia, who fronted the band from 1991-97, was more of a pure-blues singer.

“Mac is a bit more soulful, more gritty, so we’re having fun with that,” Vachon said. “We try to play to the strengths of what people can do.”

Vachon is now Roomful’s producer and nominal leader, but he plays down the role’s importance in this ensemble-first crew.

“Now I’m the bandleader, I guess. It sort of fell into my lap, but I don’t dictate the whole thing. I’m more of an organizer. We’ve all been playing a long time, so there’s no reason for a supreme dictator.”

Nor, Lataille said, is there an absolute need to score a breakthrough hit.

“Unless some kind of quirk of nature occurs, that’s not going to happen unless you have the [major label] money behind you. But we’re not on a major label, we don’t have a major media push behind us. It’s not imperative that that happen.

“We’ve kept building our fan base over the years,” Lataille continued. “We know if we put a CD out, we’ll sell a certain amount and get a certain number of people at a show. We’re not going to crawl into a corner and die because we don’t have a hit record.”

* Roomful of Blues, Peter Dobson Blues Band and Big Brian & the Blues Busters play tonight at the Coach House, 33157 Camino Capistrano, San Juan Capistrano. 8 p.m. $13.50-$15.50. (949) 496-8930.