Lighter Shade of the Blues

Tom Ball and Kenny Sultan are an acoustic blues duo who don’t play any of those crying-in-your-beer songs. Whatever mojo these Santa Barbarians have working aims for the funny bone. Saturday night, Ball & Sultan will bring these “good-time blues” to the historic Olivas Adobe in Ventura.

Ball--a blues historian, record collector, harmonica player and owner of a great, gruff blues voice--along with guitar virtuoso Sultan have been a low-budget blues band for almost 20 years now. They have unearthed a number of obscure and frequently hilarious blues songs. Plus, their originals could crack a smile on a statue of J. Edgar Hoover.

No deep introspection or reams of exposition are necessary to figure out Ball & Sultan. They write and sing about important stuff like women and liquor and various combinations thereof. From “Who Drank My Beer?” a sample line: “Who drank my beer / when I was in the rear? / Somebody point me out that moocher / I’m gonna dislocate his future.”

Or from “Perfect Woman,” another sample: “I found the perfect woman, boys / Who could ask for more? / She’s smart and pretty, young and witty / And owns a liquor store.”

Back from yet another traveling-light road trip (two guys, one guitar and one harmonica), Ball discussed the latest during a recent phone interview.

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How’s the last album, “Double Vision,” doing? And are you guys rich rock stars yet?

Man, I wish we were. Who knows how it’s doing? You’re lucky if you ever see a statement when you’re with an independent label. We hope to start a new record about the first of the year, but right now, we don’t have the material. Neither of us are highly motivated songwriters. We work better if we’re under a deadline.

Where did “Perfect Woman” come from?

I don’t know where the song came from. I just made it up one day, and Kenny came up with the music.

How’s the blues biz?

This is the busy time of the year for us--there’s a festival somewhere almost every weekend. It’s become really seasonal the last few years. The summers have been getting better and the winters have been getting worse. But that’s OK, that gives us time in the winter to write songs and do other stuff.

You’re two white guys from Santa Barbara. Besides no parking at Nordstrom’s, how does anyone get the blues in Santa Barbara?

If your surfboard wax melts in the sun? Hey, Santa Barbara is a blues center just like Chicago and New Orleans--you didn’t know that? Yeah, right. I don’t know that we have the blues, because a lot of blues isn’t about feeling bad but getting rid of the blues. I just grew up listening to the stuff. First, it was the Kingston Trio and the Brothers Four, then I dug deeper and found Woody Guthrie, Lightnin’ Hopkins and Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee. I used to go see them at the Ashgrove in L.A. when I was a kid. So did Kenny, but I didn’t know him then yet.

How many originals and how many covers do you play?

It’s about half and half now. Most of the covers we do are so obscure that most people think that we wrote them, but we won’t take credit for stuff we didn’t write. The supply of that stuff is not exactly endless, and we’re reaching the bottom of the barrel. We stick to the lighter stuff. There’s a lot of stuff I like listening to but would not want to cover. I’d sound like an idiot if I was singing about coal miners and sharecroppers--man, I’m from Santa Barbara.

“Good-time blues,” that’s you guys?

Yeah, we play good-time blues. Most blues songs aren’t supposed to give you the blues, but to drive the blues away. All blues songs aren’t mournful and sad--some of them are--but a lot of them are about good times.

What was your strangest gig?

Well, we played the rec room of an insane asylum in the Netherlands in 1991. That’s where our accommodations were. The day before, we played a festival before 70,000 people with Bob Dylan, Iron Maiden and Paul Simon, and we thought, “Man, we’re on our way.” The next night, we played for 20 people in an insane asylum, but they were happy.

Are the blues getting bigger or what?

I think it’s getting a little bigger the last five or six years. Now I hear blues songs in movies and commercials. Blues is gradually bullying its way into the mainstream.

Do you remember your first gig?

Our first gig was on a radio show. Kenny was trying to plug his guitar course at UCSB. The people at Sojourner’s Cafe in Santa Barbara heard it and hired us. We had no material, so we stole a bunch of songs and played there for a few months. Our first big gig was opening for Randy Newman at Campbell Hall at UCSB.

Let’s talk about something important. You guys have been everywhere; who has the best beer?

Ireland. It didn’t take me long to answer that one, did it? If you drink Guinness over there, it’s better because it’s fresher. If they send it over here, it has to be pasteurized, and that ruins beer.

How ‘bout those Dodgers--are they going to do it?

They better start pretty damn quick if they are. I don’t mind them trading [Pedro] Astacio, and I think [Eric] Young is a good player. I think [Tom] Candiotti can do the job for Astacio. We’ll see.

BE THERE

Tom Ball & Kenny Sultan at the Olivas Adobe, 4200 Olivas Park Drive, Ventura. Saturday at 7 p.m. Adults $8, seniors and children $6. (805) 658-4726.