Forget the labels and just listen

After 15 years slugging it out in the L.A. scene, the BellRays’ Lisa Kekaula may not yet have heard it all. But she has heard most of it.

She’s heard about her voice, a brassy, buttery instrument that measures up nicely against soul icons like Aretha Franklin. She’s heard about her band’s sound, a genre-bending mix of Stax/Volt funk and churning, studded-belt guitar. And above all she’s been asked to pick sides: Do you play soul? Punk? Soul-punk? Which is it?

“It just kind of shows how narrow our scope of experience has gotten, and what our expectations are as a society,” she says. “People just see this thing where you got to do one or the other, and you don’t.

“People are a lot more flexible mentally than most consumer-based products give them credit for,” she adds with a laugh.

With Kekaula’s husband and longtime bandmate, Bob Vennum, at the controls, the BellRays’ seventh album, “Have a Little Faith,” boasts more nuanced touches such as strings, horns and silky backing vocals, but not at the expense of the band’s raw edge. The end result has already landed on a few midyear best-of lists, such as Chicago Public Radio’s “Sound Opinions” program with critics Greg Kot and Jim DeRogatis.

Despite all the out-of-town praise, the BellRays have not always drawn large crowds at home. Next week’s show at the Wiltern LG with Radio Birdman is their biggest local date since opening for the reunited Pixies last year. But Kekaula isn’t worried about conquering L.A. “So long as people respond to the records we make and the records are still out there, then we’re doing all we possibly can,” she says. “We can look at ourselves in the mirror every morning and say, ‘Yeah, we did it. We did what makes us feel good.’ ”

*

Chris Barton

*

The BellRays, with Radio Birdman, Burning Brides and Charley Horse, the Wiltern LG, 3790 Wilshire Blvd., L.A. 7:30 p.m. Wednesday. $25. (213) 380-5005.