Jackie Zealous is a three-piece garage-rock band, but it’s also the name of a real person. Not one of the members, though—the name belongs to a guy they met at their practice space who provides them with a lot of unsolicited advice. And he lives in a van right outside.
“He sits in on some of our practices, and tells us what we should be doing from the business side of things,” says drummer Ryan Lee. “He’ll tell us that we’re too laid back and we need to go off—and then threaten to kick us.”
The trio obviously has a goofy side, but they also have some real songwriting skills, a couple of notches above the standard fuzzed-out, cymbal-crashing psych-garage formula. There’s some sophisticated Rubber Soul-era Beatles, and late-’60s Kinks influences in there. The only music they have online at the moment are some mellow acoustic demos of their songs, and they work stripped down because of the strong pop sensibilities. Live, they play the songs much faster and more distorted.
“I started playing guitar when I was 14-15. My goal wasn’t to become a technically good player. I was always a lot more interested in writing good songs,” says singer/guitarist Eddie Curzon.
Though their current set of about 15 songs were all written by Curzon, everyone in the group is a singer-guitarist-songwriter. However, they all wanted to be in a band together, so Lee and Zach Scott decided to take up drums and bass, respectively.
New recordings are in the works, and they’ll all be full-band songs, not just demos. As for their musical mentor that inspired their name, the band hasn’t seen him around lately.
“Where his van is usually parked, there’s a boot there. I guess he’s gone,” Lee says.
INFO: 9 p.m. Jan. 10. Crepe Place, 1134 Soquel Ave., Santa Cruz. $8. 429-6994.
