The Tinglerz

It's hot, and the neighbors are getting hotter.

The band's pushing it hard in a small, stuffy garage barely 10 feet wide, illuminated only by a spare bulb that hangs from the wall, heat radiating from the place like freshly poured asphalt.

Joe Perv's got his game face on, his features contorted into a pained grimace, like he's trying to digest broken glass as he lashes at his bright green drum kit.

To his left, bassist Jhen Kobran, clad in jeans and a tattered Exploited T-shirt, plays from the back of her heels, "bitch" scrawled across the pick guard of her deep red instrument.

To his right, singer/guitarist Kei yelps as if his tonsils were on fire, clawing at his instrument like he was trying to scratch some impossible itch.

Two days later, The Tinglerz will play their first show.

But right now, their audience consists primarily of an agitated gray-haired dude from a few houses away, who's worked up that his wife can hear Perv's kick drum from their bedroom.

Perv calms the guy down eventually.

"That was our first noise complaint," he grins afterward.

And it probably won't be the last for this promising new power trio.

The band's a reunion of sort for Perv and Kei, who played together in well-traveled punk combo The Pervs before breaking up in 2003.

"My dad got sick and I got a little distracted from what was what. But it was an amicable split," says Perv, who most recently played with co-ed punks The Objex. "It was cool."

As for Kei, who fronted Vegas rockers Jupiter Shifter after The Pervs, he's had to recover from a bad car accident he suffered last year.

"I was out of it for a while, but I was playing by myself, doing songs, and I played some for Joe," he says. "Different stuff, quiet stuff."

And then there's Kobran, a Boston transplant who used to play in national rockers Half Cocked and Slunt before growing wary of the music business for a while.

"I was trying to get out of retirement," says Kobran on joining up with the band. "They just had a really good sound and sensibility -- that sounds so contrived, but it's true. They sounded close enough to what I like to listen to that I could contribute -- and make them my slaves."

Together, the three bash out coarse yet hooky garage rock that ranges from a gritty, hard-eyed swing to open throttle punk flavored by Kei's Chuck Berry-esque solos and Perv's jazzy drumming.

Sitting at Perv's kitchen table after practice, dining on burgers as Perv's dog, Detour, angles for scraps, the band chats up some of their musical favorites: Zeke, John Mellencamp, The Police, Buddy Rich, Queens of the Stone Age.

It's a lot to take in. Just ask the guy across the street.

"We're still feeling each other out," Kobran says. "Everybody came to the table with a lot of different stuff. And all of it rocks."

Jason Bracelin's "Sounding Off" column appears on Tuesdays.
- Jason Bracelin

When The Tinglerz leave the Bunkhouse stage Saturday night, drummer Joe Perv seems very much in need of some Ritalin. He plays the drums like Michael Jordan played basketball—mouth open and tongue out, like he really means business as he drives the trio through a fast set of garage-rock with obvious Ramones undertones.

By the time I catch up with him, he's sweat-covered and shirtless; when I ask if he downs a gallon of Gatorade after each show, he reveals his secret weapon, Emergen-C, which he jokes can be snorted for maximum effectiveness.

The Tinglerz are a new group formed by a pair of old friends, Joe (real last name: Mascolino) and guitarist Kei (no last name offered). They first played together in then-duo The Pervz when Joe was "29 for the first time." (Actually, they began in 2002.) A later incarnation of the band, featuring Joe and a set of single-named brothers, Dylan and Dallas, made the cover of Las Vegas Weekly in March 2005 before The Pervz bowed out for good later that year.

Kei went on to front Jupiter Shifter, while Joe spent 2006 and '07 anchoring The Objex before becoming disinterested in that band's creative direction. Eager to return to rock's roots, rather than the high-speed punk Joe had been playing with The Objex, the two reunited through the wonders of Craigslist, and have been gigging as The Tinglerz since May.
I ask Joe how his new band's sound differs from The Pervz's, as Clay from The Mapes, another local band playing tonight's Tromapalooza festival—a night of music and wild sideshow acts benefiting Utah's TromaDance Film Festival—walks by. "It's a lot better!" Clay shouts. Joe laughs and admits that his musicianship has improved with experience. He says bassist Eric Laux, recently discovered via Craigslist and onboard for just three shows so far, has already taken The Tinglerz to another level.

by Allison Duck - Las Vegas Weekly