It was two, two shows in one.
Maybe you came to see British songwriter, producer and performer extraordinaire Nick Lowe, late of pub rock stalwarts Brinsley Schwarz and Rockpile, and longtime collaborator with Elvis Costello, whose best records Lowe produced.
Or maybe you came to see the mysterious masked men of surf rock, Los Straitjackets, whose roots are in the great instrumental NYC outfit, The Raybeats.
Either way, you got them both at Summerfest's BMO Harris Pavilion on Sunday evening, despite the rain.
How did this happen?
Well, Yep Roc Records labelmates Lowe and Los Straitjackets got together for some mainly holiday-music themed tours a few years ago and then the latter did an entire CD of covers of songs by the former.
When Lowe decided to record his first new music in five years – released on the "Tokyo Bay" EP – he laced up Los Straitjackets as his backing band.
And, now, they're back on the road.
Our photographer, Ty Helbach, was there...
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
