Music | 14 September 2004

Austin-based band Los Lonely Boys are blazing on Texican Style, a 96-minute concert recorded before a huge, wildly enthusiastic audience in the Texas state capitol in March, 2004. And the brothers Garza do it with what remains rock & roll's most basic and reliable format: the rock guitar trio. True, there's nothing earth-shatteringly original going on here; guitarist Henry, like many others from Texas and everywhere else, is channeling Jimi Hendrix via Stevie Ray Vaughan, with a little Carlos Santana on the side (Jojo is the outstanding bassist, while Ringo--his real name, by the way--plays drums, of course). But Los Lonely Boys bring something else to the party: good singing (all three are capable lead and harmony vocalists), and enough other influences, from Tex-Mex to the Beatles, to forge a distinctive, melodically appealing sound.