A local twang

King King and country? It’s true. Each month, the club is home to a good old-fashioned Hollywood honky-tonk replete with beautiful babes and cowboys, pretty boys and cowgirls, and is about as authentic as anything in Hollywood can be.

The monthly Eastbound and Down night -- the brainchild of actress Joey Lauren Adams, who promotes it with her friend Victoria Vaughn -- is turning into one of the most popular musical nights at the reincarnated club. Two hundred to 300 closet country fans party until the wee hours on the third Sunday of each month to the sounds of Eastbound and Down, a concocted band made up of some of the most talented singers and musicians in the city’s emerging country music scene.

“Like all transplants here, we leave our hometowns to get away from it all, but then we find the longer we’re here, the more we want to cling to our roots,” said Adams, who grew up in Arkansas and is best known for her lead role in the film “Chasing Amy.” “I used to go to the old King King for the blues and the ska, and I knew there was a great opportunity here for a great musical night. What’s cool about a honky-tonk in the South is that you don’t get that too-cool-for-school atmosphere.”

King King, a La Brea Avenue music lover’s paradise that closed its doors in 1993, reopened in April in a historic brick French chateau-style building at the corner of Hollywood Boulevard and Whitley Avenue. Owner Mario Melendez helped construct the one-room, red-tinged venue, which offers live blues, Latin and rock music. He gave Adams a chance to throw her party five months ago to see if she could attract 50 patrons. Adams delivered that many -- times five.

“I like all forms of music, but when she asked me why I didn’t have a country music night, I told her I didn’t have the expertise nor the time to develop one,” Melendez said. “It’s turned into one of the best nights we have here. There are a surprising number of people in Los Angeles who are into that music.”

The success, fans agree, is due to the raw talent of the band -- Keith Gattis, Waylon Paine, Travis Howard, Mitch Marine, Lucas Cheadle and Chris Lawrence. The bandmates, who set aside their individual alt-country careers to come together for this one night a month, play only 1970s cover songs, like “Dinosaur” and “Eastbound and Down,” and sing with surprise special guests like Dwight Yoakam.

“They’re really the leading edge of this alternative country movement which hasn’t been named yet,” said Margot Hamilton, who is producing a documentary about Gattis and Paine. The special guests are a way of giving fans something new to look forward to each month, said Vaughn, whose brother, actor Vince Vaughn, has attended the party.

Jerry Tate, 56, a native Texan who proudly displays the 1982 bull-riding championship emblazoned on his belt buckle, is a fixture at the honky-tonk because he feels a kinship with the band.

“I love the music and the fact that there’s no line dancing here,” he said while drinking some whiskey. “I believe that if you dance with a woman, you should be holding her. This is a little Hollywood, because where I’m from everybody wears boots and hats and long-sleeve shirts. But I enjoy this.”

Indeed, the Eastbound and Down crowd is part hard-core country and part industry hip; (white and black; lean and overweight; young and old, which is how Adams and Vaughn want it. There is no velvet rope, no guest list and no VIP area. “If you’re not playing, you’re paying,” Vaughn said. The $7 cover charge pays for the band.

“It hasn’t been that cool recently to be a country music fan, but it’s starting to be more in vogue now,” said Howard, who plays rhythm guitar and helped Adams put together the band. “This has turned into a community thing.”

“I love the guys in the band,” said a 50-something Mexican American woman who would only give her first name, Ana. “They have beautiful voices. But they also have beautiful bodies.”

Which is something Alabama native Charlie Terrell, a country and blues singer in the audience, noticed too. “I have a problem with the singer in the middle,” Terrell said. “Nobody has those kinds of abs. All those boys could be on the cover of magazines. A real honky-tonk is about racism, misogynistic behavior and drinking. It’s not a real honky-tonk unless there’s a minimum of five fights. And there would never be this many good-looking girls. But at least the sound is the real thing.”

The night is dedicated to traditional country music, so the band does not play originals. “We pay respect to a style of music we appreciate and admire,” Gattis said. “What’s cool is that we’re playing honky-tonk in the middle of Hollywood.”

To find out how intoxicating the music can be, follow Melendez, who grew up in East L.A. According to bartenders, it’s becoming common for the boss to drive up to work in his ’65 red Chevy pickup truck blasting “Rhinestone Cowboy.”

*

Eastbound and Down

Where: King King, 6555 Hollywood Blvd., Hollywood.

When: Third Sunday of each month.

Cost: $7 cover, free parking behind the club.

Info: (323) 960-9234