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By GINA VIVINETTO, Times Pop Music Critic

© St. Petersburg Times, published May 20, 2001

In Our Own Back Yard: An occasional roundup of music released by local artists.

BITE SIZE, EVERYTHING'S ROSY Tampa musician Chris Lunceford has for years been playing with every band in town. He now reaps the benefits as talented friends do guest spots on Everything's Rosy, the debut from Bite Size, Lunceford's alt-pop trio.

The 22-track double album (some debut!) is filled with peppy, jingle-jangle pop, which hints of Belle & Sebastian and vintage Blake Babies, especially when Corey Jane Holt -- the ex-Mrs. Lunceford -- chimes in on boy-girl vocals.

Everything's Rosy isn't all sweet; stay with it and weirder sounds abound, like on the flamenco-flavored Two So Wrong. You also get trumpet from ex-Helium Bomb singer Todd Tedder and some mighty theremin from scenester Laura Taylor. (bitesize@tampabay.rr.com).

THE ISLAND BOYS, CARRIBEAN CARNIVAL Keyboardist Winston Colbert and drummer Joshua Culler are a musical duo who don Hawaiian shirts and play cheerful Calypso-flavored originals. On Carribean Carnival, the ditties range from the bouncy Down in Jamaica, with its tidy keyboard reggae, to the harmonica-colored Rodeo Pan. Both guys sing, and Culler's refreshing steel drums pepper some tracks, such as the instrumental Falson, with its fun, squishy synths and cavalier island groove. (The Island Boys, 5122 31st Ave. S, Gulfport, FL 33707.)

CHUCK OWEN & THE JAZZ SURGE, MADCAP (SEA BREEZE RECORDS) Chuck Owen is a professor of jazz studies at the University of South Florida. He has also nabbed a ASCAP/IAJE commission for his piece Red Beans and Ricely Yours, in honor of Louis Armstrong.

But forget all that highbrow stuff. As director of the big band Jazz Surge, Owens knows all about hijinks and mayhem and fun. Madcap consists of four originals, both knockouts, and two totally fresh arrangements of the standards But Beautiful and Beautiful Love.

The ensemble plays traditionally, but with a tapping, snapping, hep finger on a modern pulse. Electric guitar stirs up the title track. Next, check out I Don't Hear Nothin' with its sultry marriage of soprano sax and trumpet. The tune is nervy and full of fresh razzle dazzle. (owen@arts.usf.edu or seabreezejazz.com)

CAR BOMB DRIVER, OFFICIAL BOOTLEG Car Bomb Driver, from St. Petersburg, plays punk rock, period. The quartet, long a staple of the local scene, delivers whiplash-fast tunes about nasty girls driving around in cool old Dodge Darts and hating their crummy jobs. Official Bootleg even offers a timely anthem: I Just Wanna Be a Ramone.

Singer Dave Reader, in trademark Buddy Holly frames, looks deceptively nebbishy. But listen closely: Reader rants with adolescent venom on Chicks Don't Dig Me, except, what's that he says? "Monday I'm gonna work off this gut?" Some things never change, at least in punk rock.

Some themes, too, are apparently timeless. Dead Nude Girl recalls Alice Cooper's Cold Ethyl, even if you don't want it to. The band does plenty of breakneck starts and stops and wild tempos. Locker room humor and all, Bootleg Music is a fun, smutty celebration of youth. (3600 38th Ave. N, St. Petersburg, FL 33713)

BONNIE WHITEHURST, BOARDWALKS AND TANK TOWNS Bonnie Whitehurst, from Palm Harbor, composes elegant piano music. Her latest, Board Walks and Tank Towns, chronicles her family's road trip through the United States and Canada. Each of the scenic Boardwalks compositions is named for a city or region Whitehurst explored, and it's colored with that area's flavor.

The gentle lull of Cedar Rapids features lovely accompanying violin. Hear the sass of Decatur. Lubec's sultry shuffle and the ragtime feel of Memphis are surely nods to Whitehurst's hero, Scott Joplin. (www.bonniewhitehurst.com or 727 784-1135)

RONNY ELLIOTT, POISONVILLE (BLUE HEART) After glowing reviews from NPR's Fresh Air and Entertainment Weekly, plus a huge feature on him in No Depression, local stalwart Ronny Elliott must be feeling fine. He should. His latest, Poisonville, is more of his signature, sassy alt-country.

Elliott may come off as a good ol' boy, but he's no dummy. Burn, Burn, Burn, written, the scholarly Elliott informs us in liner notes, while he was reading Jack Kerouac, is raucous fun. Poisonville's title was lifted from novelist Dashiel Hammett. Later, Elliott writes of his debt to the Italian artist Modigliani. Suspicious for a redneck, I'd say.

This CD runs the gamut: Room 101 is about Sid and Nancy's fateful night at the Chelsea Hotel. The poignant Letter From a Birmingham Jail is gut-wrenching and provocative, written about the four little girls killed in the 1961 Birmingham church bombings, to whom Elliott dedicates the album. (www.ronnyelliott.com)

LOOPHOLE, LOOPHOLE Loophole's four-song debut disc is a throwback to old-fashioned rock with brains and bravura. No loopy loop samples here. Nor chronic hip-hop beats. Just bass, drums and wild guitars, courtesy of Bobby "the Six String Asian Creation" Vongvenekeo and fellow axeman Rick Delgado.

Loophole singer Adam Gerard knows his way around a brooding lyric without sounding like a whiny, moody brat. Gerard should give pointers to some of MTV's pouty poster boys. Formed just last year, Loophole writes songs exploring topics more complex than your typical rock fare. Deep will stir you when heartbroken Gerard sings, "Father always said to me, "Son, watch your back.' " (loophole@disinfo.net)

MARK NEVER, AFTERNOON DRIFT, COLD SHOULDERS (SCREW MUSIC FOREVER) On Afternoon Drift, Cold Shoulders Mark Never (better known as Tampa musician-writer Mark McManus) sings of bullfrogs, iguanas, coffee and oranges, with music fleshed out on accordion, French cafe-style. Never sings lines such as, "I have seen the flies on the tongues!" in a hilarious French accent. You wonder when Edith Piaf will chime in with a line or two about amphibians.

Afternoon Drift features lots of synthy instrumentals, kooky spoken-word pieces and liner notes of odd haiku. Fans of They Might Be Giants and King Missile will surely dig Never's silly, occasionally brilliant wit. (Available at Vinyl Fever in Tampa.)

GOTOHELLS, ROCK 'N' ROLL AMERICA (VAGRANT) GoToHells, from St. Petersburg, is a band unabashedly in love with rock. Old school rock, that is, with a punky edge. Think power chords and big, cheesy anthemic choruses. This quartet, which got its start in 1992, has likely listened to a lot of old MC5, Richard Hell and the Voidoids and New York Dolls. Check out the raunch and delicious irreverence of Wasted. That song's swaggering, singalong chorus and crunch-crunch guitar could have knocked Aerosmith off the charts in the 1970s.

Rock 'n' Roll America is a celebration of tough guys and machismo, even if it's mostly tongue-in-cheek, with song titles such as Lock Up Your Daughters, Sin Baby and Drink Poison, Wrestle Snakes. It's enough to make David Johansen and the late Johnny Thunders beam with pride. (www.vagrant.com)

DAN MCMILLION JAZZ ORCHESTRA, GOT THE SPIRIT (SEA BREEZE) Trumpeter Dan McMillion has a wonderful thing going with the fabulous big band Jazz Orchestra. Remember the sweet, swingy sounds of Benny Goodman, Tommy Dorsey and Glenn Miller? McMillion and gang have the gusto and chops to stir up those memories and create new ones.

Got the Spirit will get toes tapping with its blend of originals and standards. Take Knarf, penned by McMillion: It's sly and rascally, with a sizzling baritone sax solo by Valerie Gillespie and McMillion himself tearing it up on trumpet. The orchestra's cooking rendition of Duke Ellington's It Don't Mean a Thing If It Ain't Got That Swing is a primer on the art of ensemble playing. (seabreezejazz.com)

If you would like your local act's CD considered for In Our Own Back Yard, send it to Gina Vivinetto, St. Petersburg Times, P.O Box 1121, St. Petersburg, FL 33731.

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