Kick Out the Jams: Clydesdale at House of Brews, Feb. 2

The audience was sparse when alt-country quartet Clydesdale took the stage last Wednesday at the House of Brews. Eight distracted girls debated who among them had the best slut shoes while a few dozen barflies piled in the back around video poker machines. But by the time the band was tearing through its frenetic cow-punk cover of "Folsum Prison Blues," things had changed. Forty people had crammed closer to singer Paige Overton as her ferocious howl threatened to rip the roof off the dive.

Clydesdale's burgeoning reputation as Las Vegas' best live act has much to do with their habit of quickly charming unfamiliar crowds. But it's not the band's rousing versions of Johnny Cash's best song or Nancy Sinatra's "These Boots Are Made for Walkin'" that win over the uninitiated. It's Clydesdale's rollicking original material, songs that are actually better than its clever covers. Switching between a hollering wail and a breathless moan, Overton tells tales of sex, insanity, wandering lovers and shamed cowboys over punchy country punk. Clydesdale's best songs, the stomping "Pleasure" and the dreamy "Pins in Plates," see guitarist Andrew Kasawa, bassist Jason Aragon and drummer Courtney Carroll exchanging knowing glances as they create a lockstep groove behind her.

Plus, they're interesting to look at. Tonight, Overton resembles a Brit mod housewife in denim, heels and beehive. Tall drink of water Kasawa wears painted-on-tight Wranglers and a cowboy hat as he picks out sinister guitar lines a la Reverend Horton Heat. Plucking a fretless bass, the lanky Aragon is in full-on `60s Eastwood gaucho mode in poncho and drawstring straw hat. A tattered shirt hangs from the shoulders of pixie-cute Carroll as she pounds the drums and pushes and pulls her squeezebox.

But Overton and her powerful vocal cords provoke the most interest. In "All the Way Up My Skirt," she summons a fiery eroticism: "I finally turned into my body-ee-yee/ A hot kiss boils my blood/ I tried I tried to open my mouth/ But the words hit the floor with a thud." The rollicking "Another Sleepless Night" shows off just how confidently she can hit notes as she croons, "I've already lost my sleep and sanity-ee-ayahay-eee."

This is visceral honky tonk not to be missed.--Jim Bialek