CONTEMPORARY MUSIC / JOHN D’AGOSTINO : Its Musical Blend Lends to Group’s Distinct Sound

Virgin Records’ exec Mark Williams was enthusing about a new band, the Immigrants, now recording a debut album in Los Angeles.

“They fuse alternative and traditional rock in a way that creates a fresh sound,” he said in a phone conversation Monday afternoon. “Sort of the Cult meets ‘Gimme Shelter’-era Stones, with a bit of blues and even country thrown in. They’re going to excite some people.”

Probably, the record’s release this summer will resonate loudest in several La Jolla homes. Four of the six Immigrants--guitarist Tommy Andrews and keyboardist John Nau, both 27, bassist John Krylow, 25, and drummer Mike Parma, 29--went to school together in La Jolla. The last is the son of Leon Parma, a prominent local businessman (Coast Distributing, La Jolla Bank & Trust) and a general partner in the new ownership of the San Diego Padres.

The band’s non-La Jollans are not without their own pedigree. Twenty-seven-year-old guitarist Charlie Longhi’s parents own the popular Longhi’s restaurant in Lahaina, on Maui (great linguine with calamari in red sauce). The most famous Immigrant, Welsh vocalist Michael Aston, 28, fronted the well-known British band Gene Loves Jezebel before breaking away two years ago.

Andrews was a member of another La Jolla-bred hard-rock band, the Voices, who produced a self-titled album for MCA Records in 1989. That record hit the racks affixed with a sticker proclaiming, “Of the zillion bands looking for a record deal, the Voices created a signing war. The dust has settled but not the excitement.”

Industry hyperbole aside, the quintet soon found itself in the middle of a war it couldn’t possibly win. Andrews, who was in town visiting family over the weekend, described how the Voices got incinerated in the Hollywood crucible, and how the Immigrants emerged from their ashes.

“The Voices were a good band that never really had a chance,” Andrews said. “We were personally signed to MCA by (president) Irving Azoff, who then left to form his own label, Giant Records. The guy who took his place, Al Teller, didn’t want to inherit Azoff’s projects, so he ignored us. And because we were considered ‘Irving’s baby,’ we hadn’t cultivated a relationship with the rest of the MCA staff, so they ignored us, too. We sort of got lost in the shuffle.”

MCA couldn’t be bothered with promoting the album, and even refused to supply decorative “flats”--reprints of the album cover--for a record-release party held at La Jolla’s Hard Rock Cafe. Arrangements for the party itself were made not by MCA’s marketing people, but by an old chum from the band’s days in La Jolla. With almost no company push behind it, “The Voices” still managed to sell 30,000 to 40,000 copies.

“Our management at the time was in the dark as to what was going on (with MCA), and that kept us in the dark, too,” Andrews recalled. “We kept hearing that we were going out on the road with Warren Zevon, or this or that artist, but nothing ever materialized.”

Frustrated with the stasis, the Voices walked out on their MCA contract. Last September, Voices bassist Todd Hoffman (another La Jollan) was recruited by the popular British group, the Cult. Andrews, too, went in search of a new gig.

“A woman at a music publishing company told me that Michael Aston was looking for a band,” Andrews said. “I had met him a year or two earlier at the Prince’s Trust concert in London, where I was playing guitar in Belinda Carlisle’s band. So I contacted him and we hit it off pretty well.”

It was Aston who chose the name the Immigrants, one Andrews finds appropriate. “There are a number of nationalities represented in the band,” he said. “Mike and Charlie are very Italian. John Nau is German. Michael is literally an immigrant from Wales. It’s a mixture that carries over into our music, as well. We have a lot of influences from all over the world.”

Andrews described the Immigrants’ sound as a compound of mostly ‘60s and ‘70s styles from both sides of the Atlantic--Deep Purple, Stones, Doors, Led Zeppelin, Velvet Underground, Alex Harvey. “But I want to emphasize that we’re not a ‘70s band,” Andrews cautioned. “We all grew up listening to British and American rock and R&B;, so that’s in our blood. But we’re a very modern band. We have both hard-rock and dance sensibilities. It’s a Big Guitar sound with dramatic lyrics to match.”

Andrews believes that those familiar with both his and Aston’s past work will be surprised by the upcoming album.

“It’s a hard sound, but there are folk accents that make it different,” he explained. “Our use of mandolin, acoustic guitar, and percussion gives the music a definite Celtic feel.” That, and certain intangibles, are what the Immigrants and their label hope will distance the band from its competition.

“I know this will sound strange,” said Andrews, “but the album is better than any of us expected. We were all in agreement as to what sound we wanted to achieve, but when we actually started recording this music, it almost took on its own personality. There’s magic happening in that studio. It’s already the most exciting project I’ve ever been involved with.”

The tentative release date for the as-yet-untitled album is July 30. Andrews predicts the Immigrants will begin performing live locally within two or three months.

If folk singer Deborah Liv Johnson ever attends a taping of the David Letterman show on a night when the host conducts those “Brush with Fame” interviews with members of the audience, she’ll have a good one ready.

In June 1989, Johnson was in Washington, D.C., to interview folk music legend Pete Seeger in her role as editor of “Footprints,” the newsletter published by the local mountaineering and travel store, A-16. She was staying at the home of Dick Cerri, a folk music radio-show host, when touring folk star Tom Paxton called looking for a weekend roost. Paxton and Johnson ended up sharing Cerri’s pad.

Johnson might have been satisfied with the insights into the music biz she gained from long conversations with Paxton, but the latter invited her to share the stage with him at the Birchmere, a folk club in nearby Alexandria, Va. Johnson’s songs were well-received by an audience of several hundred who had come to hear the composer of “The Last Thing on My Mind” and “Whose Garden Was This?”

This Friday, Johnson will perform her first local concert in some time at Choices restaurant in the Torrey Pines area. She of the voice that flows like Beaujolais--and the repertoire that now ranges from work-shirt blues to watercolor ballads to country--will be joined on a few songs by another fine local talent, Peggy Watson (the two will be the subject of an upcoming taping for KPBS radio).

Recently, Johnson and guitarist Peter Sprague co-wrote a song, “He’s Gone to Travel,” for a new album by Sprague’s band, BrasilJazz. Johnson hopes to release her own album, her second, later in the year.