Joey's Wonderful World
Live in Los Angeles
Last week I witnessed the phenomenal, the astounding, the more than just Wonderful World of Joey at Goldfingers in Hollywood. I'm told that they're playing Thursday nights there from now on and I cannot emphasize enough how much you should not miss them. OK, so I'm new to town, maybe you know about them already, but here I shall rave...
Lots of covers, some originals. Lots of cheek and savoir faire. The predominant factor here was 60's 60's 60's. The go-go dancer/tambourine girl is fantastic. The band members are consummate musicians, professional, but with a lot of heart and soul, and more than a little sense of humor (they continually interrupted the evening with their goofy take on "African"-style exotica for absolutely no reason other than obnoxiousness-- which was great! When was the last time you saw musicians on stage having fun?) and of course, there's Joey himself. Joey is a fabulous performer, giving it his all, lots of vegas stage moves and antics, dancing on the bar, on tables, mingling with audience members. Joey also knows when to give the spotlight to guests like old-schooler's Mr. Eddie Vegas and Hedda Brooks (They were wonderful and charming and even did a duet of "All of Me"), as well as the lovely up-and-coming vocalist, Riley (last name?), who did a cool Bachrach tune.
Other covers included "Ride My Beautiful Balloon", "Sock It To Me" (??), plus others that i had heard, but just couldn't place the names. Originals were hot too, "Eddie Vegas D.U.I." was awesome, complete with a dance-move (a la YMCA, plus a James Bond move). I never laughed so hard until i heard their tune, "What Sweet Child of Mine is This?" (Guess which songs this is a hybrid of...).
Well, we managed to stay for both entire sets and also meet half the band,
even though my friend had to fly out that same morning and i had to go to
work that day -- it was WELL worth it. I've been in LA for only 5 months
now but this by far is the best show i've seen here. I was a little
disappointed in the Psycho Exotica night at Moguls (although i missed Karla
Pundit), and I wasn't all that crazy about Lars Vegas. If anyone can
recommend other good acts like Joey, clue me in!!
Cheers,
--- Kevin Lee