Pat Jordan Band

By JOHN BECK
THE PRESS DEMOCRAT

A carpenter, a dental hygienist and a headhunter walk into a bar. One picks up a harmonica, the other a bass. The last - a gregarious, wide-eyed bear of a man - grabs hold of an acoustic guitar that looks more like a toy ukulele in his hands.
But before the punchline arrives, a party breaks out. A rowdy bar-band sing-along that quickly picks up any club, even the ersatz Irish pub Finnegan's in Novato last weekend (a stripped-down show sadly missing drummer Steve Toomey).
Barely legal Marin vixens chime in with a tongue-in-cheek cover of Britney Spears' "Hit Me Baby One More Time." The hilarious lyrics to "Hugs Not Drugs" inspires a giddy dyed-blonde to yell, "He said, 'jugs!'"
No matter where the Pat Jordan Band plays - at Santa Rosa's Last Day Saloon this weekend for St. Patrick's Day, a regular gig at the Russian River Brewing Co. or the Red Devil Lounge in San Francisco - the homegrown Sonoma County foursome is quickly becoming the most likely to move booties on the dance floor, sell beer and Jaegermeister at the bar and get a crowd to sing along.
Standing out on the back patio of Finnegan's after the gig, Pat Jordan is sweating so much he has to grab a flannel shirt from his car to throw over a baseball jersey. An executive-search maven by day, the 27-year-old Cardinal Newman grad is nursing a free beer around midnight, clearly happy about winning over another new crowd. It seems to happen wherever he goes.
His familiar rootsy songs channel the barefoot melodies of Dave Matthews or John Popper. But it's still a sound all his own - a catchy acoustic groove that goes over well from pub to frat party, as songs about 10-foot-high devotion and running into an old high-school crush in the hardware store segue easily from Bob Marley to Bob Dylan.
Chatty riffs set up jokes and knock them down. The art of playing wingman translates into "Taking one for the team, so your buddy can live the dream." "Hugs Not Drugs" keeps coming back to "can and jugs" before he name-drops Sugar Ray Leonard in a line "boosted" from outtakes of the "Liar, Liar" DVD.
But he's quick to mix it up. The song he's most proud of, "Lucky Loser," seems on the surface like a breakup song. In a plaintive tone, the chorus begs, "Who's the lucky loser of this fight?"
Beneath the melody, it's a very personal story.
"I'll probably never write another song like that," Jordan says, pausing and taking a deep breath as his eyes well up.
When he was old enough to understand, his mother told him about his twin sister who died at birth, leaving him with the question: "I wonder who the lucky one is, the one who died right away or the one left to fight - so who's the lucky loser?"
It's not something he dwells on, but the point is obvious: On the surface, the Pat Jordan Band may be a tip-jar party band, but it's a party band with a heart and a surprising knack for turning 20-something experience into compelling lyrics.
"We don't have a weird scarf on our neck and weird pants, and we're not booking our photo shoot tomorrow," Jordan says.
"It's not always about us. People say, 'Oh I want to go to the Pat Jordan show because I haven't seen that guy Steve in the longest time and I know he'll be there.' And I look down sometimes and it's heartwarming, and then other times I just want to party with you guys right now."
Harmonica player Dallas Jones doesn't see any separation: "It's like we're in the crowd. We are the crowd when we play music, there's no difference."
Since 2002, when Jordan started playing solo, working out the live dynamic, gig by gig, and slowly gathering a following, the band has played venues like Petaluma's Mystic Theatre and the Red Devil Lounge, opening for American Drag, Five A.M. and Bag of Toys. From benefit gigs at the Sonoma Developmental Center to annual Chico State alumni bashes outside AT&T Park, they'll play almost anywhere.
In 2004, he met bassist Justin Bordessa after posting an ad on Craigslist. The part-time dental hygienist was playing upright jazz bass at the time, but Jordan showed him the chord progression to "Get Go," which would later become the lead song on their independently produced debut CD "April's Fools." The two became inseparable.
Inspired by bands like O.A.R. Guster and Bob Schneider, Jordan ran into Jones, a journeyman carpenter who was playing "hip-hop harmonica" at a house party. Drummer Toomey eventually hopped on board, and the band started rehearsing in a Healdsburg warehouse.
Now, they're plotting a six-date run in June, starting off at the Sweetwater Saloon in Mill Valley, moving on to Santa Barbara and the Viper Room in Hollywood.
To uninitiated promoters, Jordan tells it like this: "We're easy on the ears. We have fans from like 50 years old to 5 years old. And we're the type of band that belongs in the corner of your bar because we're having a blast and our (stuff) ain't offensive and you can tune it out or tune it in as much as you want."
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