Jim Beal Jr.
San Antonio Express-News

Call it retro if it makes you comfortable, but rockabilly is more like resilient.

Created by a bunch of seemingly crazed hillbillies, rockabilly, with its supercharged twang and insistent upright bass/drums rhythm, came out of the South in the mid-'50s. Its original heyday didn't even make it into the '60s. Still, succeeding generations of musicians and fans have continued to gravitate to rockabilly and all its trappings.

"I think it scared everyone, in a way," said bassist Lee Rocker. "Rockabilly is the original rock 'n' roll. But it's also the original punk rock. It wasn't tame." And Rocker should know. One of a trio of greased down, revved-up rock 'n' rollers from, of all places, Long Island, N.Y., Rocker in the early '80s helped take a little band called Stray Cats to England, brought it back and sparked a rockabilly revival.

Saturday, Rocker will bring his post-Cats band into Casbeers, 1719 Blanco Road. Lil' Bit & the Customatics will open at 9 p.m. Call (210) 732-3511.

Rocker and company are on the road with "Bulletproof," Rocker's fifth disc as band leader. He'll be joined by Jimmy Sage (drums), Tara Novick (guitar) and Brophy Dale (guitar, vocals).

"I started playing music really pretty young," Rocker said. "I was 7 or 8 years old. I was playing cello. I found out when I was about 12 that, growing up in New York, carrying a cello to school was not the smartest thing in the world.

"Then rock 'n' roll started to get to me and I started playing electric bass. When I was about 14 I stumbled across rockabilly. I couldn't make the electric bass sound like the bass I heard on songs by Johnny Cash, Elvis and Carl Perkins."

Rocker and some friends found a rockabilly record mother lode in the library. And he started playing upright bass.

"It was, 'What is this?' Radio in the '70s was big with synthesizers. This was the opposite. It hit me between the eyes," he said.

In the late '70s, childhood friends Rocker, guitarist Brian Setzer and drummer Slim Jim Phantom put together the Stray Cats. With an assist from guitarist, producer and roots rock icon Dave Edmunds, the band made a hit in England with tunes such as "Rock This Town," "Stray Cat Strut" and "Runaway Boys." The U.S. debut album, "Built for Speed," featuring songs from two British releases, "Stray Cats" and "Gonna Ball," scored on radio and on MTV.

"I knew from the start the band really connected with people. When we played in corner bars on Long Island people loved it. That made us stupid enough - or brave enough - to move to England," he said with a laugh.

Though the band broke up in the mid-'80s, Stray Cats have done reunions, and the band's first tour in 10 years kicks off next month. Rocker didn't dread life after Stray Cats.

"Not really," he said. "We had done the band legitimately for 15 years. That's a long time in the life of a band. I was ready to do different stuff. I was 17 when we did the first record. I'm proud of that work."

Rocker and his band also have done some good work. "Bulletproof" is a rocking roots effort with songs by Rocker and his cohorts mixed with songs from deep in the catalogs of Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins and the Beatles.

And Rocker is convinced that, while rockabilly might not top the charts anytime soon, it will always have an audience.

"It's the passion, the realness," he said. "It's American music, like blues or bluegrass. People key into it who get fed up with what's being force-fed to them."

Web Posted: 06/11/2004