It has been a banner year for Los Straitjackets, the Lucha libre-masked crusaders of wordless surf-twang guitar rock. The quartet’s new album, The Further Adventures of Los Straitjackets, was released seven months ago to generally positive reviews — not only for the band’s raging guitar instrumentals but also for the evocative comic-book concept that houses them.
“It seemed like a natural fit,” says guitarist Eddie Angel. “We’re
perfect for comic-book action heroes.”
The creation of Further Adventures was slightly different for
the band by virtue of geography and scheduling. With the foursome
(Angel and Danny Amis on guitars, bassist Pete Curry and drummer Jason
Smay) now spread out across the country, there’s less time for members
to hang out like they did when they lived closer to each other. But
they still have a strong creative connection.
“We’ve got a good chemistry, and our manager, Jake Guralnick, is
like a fifth member of the band; he’s got really good instincts,” says
Angel. “He can see from the outside what we should be doing. But this
band has been really lucky, and we’ve been able to avoid a lot of
pitfalls. We’re always motivated by what’s fun for us and what we think
our audience will want. And we’re in a good position in that we have
total creative freedom. We’ve never been on a big record label that’s
told us what we needed to do.”
With their cross-continental scattering — Angel is in
Nashville, Amis and Curry are in Los Angeles, Smay lives in Rochester,
New York — Los Straits had to become more economical with their
writing and recording sessions. This time, rather than go into the
studio with largely finished material, the quartet brought little more
than riffs and ideas and began hammering songs out of the
fragments.
“Me and Danny always have songs we’ve written on our own, but on
this one, we made an effort to write a lot of songs together as a
band,” says Angel. “Also, it came together over time, like at least a
year, where we got together at different times at Pete’s studio in L.A.
It was a pretty good way to do it, a couple of songs at a time, because
if you try to do it all at once, you get kind of dry. So it was
different. But the thing I’m most pleased with is that we can still
come up with a record that’s good. It’s what we do, but it’s fresh.
We’re not breaking any new ground, but we never claimed to do
that.”
As a result, Further Adventures crackles with intensity and
immediacy, an amazing feat for a band that’s worked the same stylistic
corner for the past decade and a half. It’s an astonishing
accomplishment when a band can make the same direction it’s explored
for 15 years over a dozen albums sound new and vital.
“It’s in our DNA,” says Angel. “I’ve been in bands my whole life,
and I can tell the difference. Some bands might have enough to do one
or two good CDs, but to keep going for 15 years, it has to be something
that’s just organic.”
Los Straits also decided it was time to follow their 2002 Christmas
album, ‘Tis the Season for Los Straitjackets, with a sophomore
holiday offering, the just-released Yuletide Beat. For their
second set of twisted Christmas tunes — from the Tarantino-ized
“We Three Kings” to the Bobby Fuller Four twang and strum of “(I) Deck
the Halls” — Los Straits once again apply their reverbed
brilliance to songs of the season.
Of course, a new Los Straits Christmas album means that a new
Christmas tour is on the way. Angel says the latest installment of Los
Straitjackets’ holiday trek, christened ¡Viva Christmas! and
featuring special guest El Vez, might be the band’s best seasonal
extravaganza.
“We’re all playing together,” says Angel. “[El Vez] was on [2001
Straitjackets album] Sing Along; he sang ‘King Creole.’ A bunch
of years ago, we did a Christmas show together. We were on the same
bill, but we opened for him. It was a lot of fun, and we thought it
would make a lot of sense. He’s got a lot of great Christmas songs,
like ‘Mamacita Donde Esta Santa Claus?’ and ‘Brown Christmas.’ It’s
going to be entertaining, I think. He’s a very theatrical guy. We’re
gonna make ’em laugh, and we’re gonna make ’em cry.”
Yuletide Beat is available in a number of limited-edition
formats. The band pressed 1,000 CDs and 1,000 10-inch red vinyl albums
in letter-pressed packaging designed by Washington, D.C. poster genius
El Jefe. The vinyl is available through straitjackets.com or Angel’s Spin Out
label; CDs and vinyl will also be available at the show. And for the
tech savvy, downloads are available through all the major services.
“I gotta say, I think this sounds really good,” says Angel with
obvious pride in the vinyl run. “It feels fun to hold it in your hands,
as opposed to CDs. It’s like a book; it feels like something real. That
would be a cool Christmas present for people.”
This article appears in Dec 2-8, 2009.