by LORRAINE CARPENTER

With a sound born at the crossroads of modern country music, where purists, jokers, cow-punks and Nashville's mainstream meet, the Sonny Best Band have gone and charmed this city's C&W buffs and indie rockers alike.

"'I don't like country, but I like you guys' - I hear that all the time," says singer-guitarist Angela Desvaux, the band's lone lady and lifelong country fan, aka "Lily Pearl." Yup, they use stage names - "Sonny Best" is Billy Kroon, "Dallas Rhodes" is (Soft Canyon's) Jason Kent and "Lucky Bucky Barnes" is (Tinker, Bionic alumnus) Eric Digras.

Aside from some subtle role-playing (the band leader's drawl, the occasional cowboy hat), there are no loud gimmicks, no flashy costumes, no cowbell, just good ol' ditties to cry and carouse to, with country-to-the-core vocals that flock together in two-, three- and four-part harmonies.

"I wanna try and make a career out of playing country, and I'm right into it these days. I don't even listen to anything else," says Kroon, admitting that his first country compositions were, more or less, just for laughs.

Through much of 2002, the band played sets stacked with covers, country-fying the likes of Foreigner, Michael Jackson and Gary Glitter, but these days their original material, as heard on their eponymous LP, produced by Jordan Zadorozny, easily outweighs and outshines the remakes.

What's more, the band is moseying over to Cairo in May, playing the Egyptian end of a Canada/Egypt cultural exchange project called Vision alongside Sam Roberts and other nationally renowned names (different artists from both countries will play Ottawa in June). The band is rightly psyched to bring country to a projected half a million people by the pyramids, but every gig is a hot one for the Sonny Best Band.

"We love making the music, we love playing and we always have a little fun with each other on stage," says Kroon.

"There's a little sexuality going on," claims Desvaux.

"It's very sexual, it's hot, but in the best way possible," adds Kroon. "We like to get all the boys and girls dancin' and romancin'."

With Katie Moore at Casa del Popolo
on Friday, Jan. 30, 9pm, $5 ($12 with CD)

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