The Odd Numbers

Like their proving grounds -- the staid nightclub district of downtown San Jose (First Street and thereabouts) -- the Odd Numbers haven't changed much in more than a decade. Unlike the land that time forgot, it's actually a good thing (it ain't broken, don't fix it). Since the late half of the 1980s, this Mod-ish power trio have been winning over a diametric audience of old, fat, drunk ex-skateboarders and nerdishly compulsive grown men in parkas. Their inebriated style of Power Pop is a magical chemistry that blends the hyper R&B bass playing of Dave Miller, the Keith Moon-on-hash drumming of John Cummings, and the soulful singing and Rickenbacker hammering frenzy of Dave Baisa, whom many simply refer to as "the Stir," or Baisa Minnelli, depending on his state of mind. Incidentally, the Odd Numbers are big in Sweden.