About the Band

Imagine yourself wandering into the lounge of a cheesy Vegas hotel. The year is 1975. You stumble into a booth and order a Blue Macao. Your attention turns to the band. Several guys are on stage in almost-matching, wide collared polyester tuxedos playing a smooth bossa nova rhythm. The singer banters with the audience. Maybe it’s the drink, but the music starts to sound a bit strange. Notes from the guitar start echoing and the keyboards take on a foreboding tone. The singers voice seems to be reverberating strangely. Are your eyes getting cloudy? The lights seem to be flickering and the cigarette smoke in the room seems to have gathered into a veritable fog through which can be seen a strange undulating dancer onstage. The music intensifies into a swirling vortex of sound, your pulse is racing and you break into a cold sweat. What the hell is going on? You start to get up to run for the exit when suddenly everything seems to die down and return to normal. You sit down and order another drink. 

 

This is the vision of Captain Dave and the Psychedelic Lounge Cats.

 

The infamous Ann Arbor band from the late 80′s and early 90′s drew inspiration from this scenario, combining such diverse influences as Andre Kostelanetz, Jobim, Bert Kaempfert, Miles Davis’ Bitch’s Brew, Javanese Gamelan, Muzak, James Brown, Ktel Disco albums, 70′s TV show themes, Martin Denny style Exotica, Black Sabbath,

Sergio Mendes, Fela, Steve Reich, obscure 70′s funk bands, the Residents, Throbbing Gristle and more to create a unique pastiche of all that is smooth, groovy and psychedelic. 

 

The band was comprised of a bunch of smart ass art and music school students who found themselves unable to take anything too seriously. The band played mostly originals, but also faithful covers of things like the Charlie’s Angels theme or covers recast in absurd genres, such as the bossa arrangement of Black Sabbath’s Faeries Wear Boots.

 

In their first public performance, a fraternity charity event at a local bar, the band had the plug pulled on them when “Anne the Bruise Dancer” sauntered on stage during a weird jam, scantily clad and covered in artificial bruises. The next day it was written up in the student paper and the band’s fame was cemented.

 

The infamous stage show developed further to included strobe lights, fog machines, 16mm films, and other bizarre dancers.

 

The Lounge Cats played Ann Arbor and the Michigan college circuit from 1988 until 1992 and then moved en masse to San Francisco. The band played there until 1995 when it finally disintegrated, forming several new bands in it’s wake.

 

Send photos or whatever to the Lounge Cats CONTACT HERE.