Petty Booka ROCKS!

I just got home from a Petty Booka show at Schuba's in Chicago and man am I jazzed! They were great! I say Petty Booka show, even though they were the opening act. They were the reason I went out at all- I even left my wife at home in bed sick (I did bring her home a CD). I had been told they are great, and they really are! If you are lucky enough to be anywhere near where they are playing on their short US tour- get there! Check their website:
http://www.petty-booka.com
They are good uke players, their backing band is terrific, and their song selection and arrangements are awesome! From the Ramones to traditional, from Patsy Cline to Cindy Lauper, they make each song unique and their own!
And they are so cute! I wanted to put them in my pocket and take them back home to be the house band for our tiki bar- (maybe when I'm rich I can hire them on a permanent basis). To temper my gushing, (can you tell I've had a couple of Singapore Slings while I listen to their record for the third time?) I can say there was a touch of Jawaiian thrown in to the mix- a genre which I have never cared for. But I have to say, though I don't have any reggae records, they even made me groove on their Marley cover.
Petty Booka was so engaging I was even able to tune out the inconsiderate morons who thought it was social hour and spent the entire set TALKING. I don't understand people who pay admission to go to a club and try to talk over the music. I feel like I should formally apologize to Petty Booka for those unfortunate idiots, but I don't think it mattered, they had the better part of the club completely enthralled.
Anyway, if you can't already tell, I think they are a blast and if they come to your town- go see 'em, if you see their record- buy it! (don't copy it from a friend- they could use the money to come back to the states).
I understand that Otto is already aware of them and had been supportive of their efforts and I have to say, kudos Otto! Keep preaching the good word! Everyone else, tell your friends.

Petty Booka is one of my faves! Good uke players, beautiful harmonies, fun songs, and so adorable! Here's photo of me with the ladies.

Boutiki~
Glad you found them! I just recently discovered them too, while at the San Francisco Tiki Crawl with fellow TC'ers. They played at Hawaii West, and they sounded great! They had no mic or audio setup, since, to my understanding, it was all impromptu, which really showed whether or not they could keep good harmony without all the audio frills. Well, they sang beautifully!

JohnnyVelour was also there, and I told him that, in person, Petty Booka sounded like some good 'ol lost 78rpm records that you always wanted to hear.

As you can see, WeirdUnc was there too, and I'd love to see all three of them do some songs together in the near future. Their vocals should compliment each other well in harmony.

Yes, they were little PUMPKINS! I got to hang out with them a bunch during South By Southwest (thanks to Otto, who told me to go look them up and say hi). Sweet sweet girls. The tinier one, Naho ("Petty"), was the only one who really speaks English, but she improves with each tour. The backing band was terrific and so nice, too. And a couple are super Spanish speakers - all right!

And such angelic harmonies! Made a tough-guy friend of mine CRY!

Their producer/svengali guy, Hiroshi, is also the one who created Pizzicato 5. (There have been other Petty's and other Booka's, if you get confused looking at the photos on the website and on the albums, of which they have MANY in Japan. Just came out with their first in the US, "Let's Talk Dirty in Hawaiian".)

SEE 'EM IF YOU CAN!!

I just saw Petty Booka in NYC. very cute and sweet. I really enjoyed the Moonlighters who opened for them. uke, guitar, slide, guitar and stand-up bass. great harmonies. 1940s style tunes. They play at Otto's Shrunken Head on Thurs.

you lucky so-n-sos! i absolutely love petty booka! wow! btw, i highly recommend their HAWAIIAN PURE HEART CD.

Here's a review which I posted: April last year:

Petty Booka's full length CD "Hawaiian Pure Heart" arrived a couple of days ago, and I've been listening to it virtually nonstop since! Petty Booka is a girl duo from Japan on the Sister label (an all girl groups label from Japan). Their name is a joining of the names of the two vocalists: Petty Asano and Booka Suskida, who appear on the inside of the CD jewel box adorned with plastic lei, cellophane grass skirts posing with ukuleles in hand.

Apparently, they were a recent sensation at Austin's SXSW:

http://www.sister.co.jp/PettyBookaUStour/index.html

"Hawaiian Pure Heart" is a collection of 13 cover songs spanning the gamut from oldies to Hawaiian traditional to 80's hit songs - all done with an "authentic Hawaiian arrangement," which means with ukes and vibes and lap steel and bongos! The duel vocals are endearinly well sung and kooky with an emphasized Japanese accent on certain lyrics so that words like "Honolulu" comes out "Honoruru".

The excellently chosen first track of the album is the classic Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polkadot Bikini, alternately sung in English and Japanese. The girls brilliantly start the song (and entire album) off with goofy bird calls (YES!) which are soon followed by bongos and bass with steel guitar falling in line accordingly.

Other highlights on the album include:

Culture Club's Do You Really Want to Hurt Me? which starts off slack key style, We'll Sing in the Sunshine, The Tide is High, and Vaya Con Dios.

In addition to "Hawaiian Pure Heart" Petty Booka have 4 (!!!) other Hawaiian albums:

Toconut's Hawaii, Blue Lagoon on which MARTIN DENNY makes a guest appearance, Summer Breeze and Ukulele Lady.

According to their website,

http://www.sister.co.up/pettybooka

these albums were recorded by Petty Booka from Hawaii. They've also done a couple of country albums (by Petty Booka from Texas), a bluegrass album (by Petty Booka from Kentucky), a Christams album and an album dedicated to songs about rain. I'm dying to get my ears wrapped around the CD with Martin Denny on it!

This is definately one of the goofiest, kitschiest, most tongue-in-cheek bands I've come across in a long time. The music pays homage to and also mixes well with classic exotica and Hawaiian while still sounding fresh and current.

Fun stuff that's worth checking out.

Tiki Chris

Thanks all for posting this info about these gals. It is these lil discoveries that keep me saying "Damn, I love this club"
I just checked out the Petty Booka site and was pretty tickled with the videos and mp3s. Definately going to pick up a CD
Mahalo,
Chongolio

Hey Gecko, check out where the Ukelele ladies are playing in Honolulu. (pic 42)
http://www.sister.co.jp/PettyBookaUStour/index.html

[ Edited by: Chongolio on 2003-03-27 21:36 ]

For those of you that have a used Japanese book & music store like I am fortunate to have, you may want to see if they have any of PB's early releases. I was lucky enough to pick up their first(?) CD release "Toconut's Hawaii" for $10. I noticed that it's not available on their website, so I figure that it's out of print.

The one song that hooked me on Petty Booka when I saw them in San Francisco was "Tiki Torches at Twilight", which is the last song on this CD. Yeah!

JapaneseThriftin'CaddyDaddy

I heard about them just before my Spring Break road trip and they were going to be in Chicago while I was there. Then we hit a change and had to leave Wednesday instead of Thursday and didn't get to see them! Turns out Kiliki got turned onto them in New Orleans while she was there too. I wish we had gotten to meet them and hit them up for the next Hukilau.