\n<\/p>\n
\n\tWhen the second installment of Little Steven\u2019s Underground Garage Cruise set sail from Miami earlier this month for a quick and noisy jaunt to Cozumel, Mexico, and back, one of the featured bands should have been more than a little rusty. The Mooney Suzuki<\/a> hadn\u2019t played a live gig in two years. Since 2019, they\u2019d only been onstage a half-dozen times.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tBut then the Mooney plugged in and, over the course of a sweaty, curfew-be-damned show in the ship\u2019s atrium, proved that more than a little time off can\u2019t dampen their chaotic brand of rock & roll.<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cWe always try to put on the show that we want to see,\u201d singer-guitarist Sammy James Jr. says the next day during a sit-down on the ship that requires him to practically shout over garage-rock pioneers the Sonics, who are sound-checking nearby. \u201cWe were working for it last night and we\u2019ve seen the various levels of ecstasy you can bring an audience to. It\u2019s like, can we get the maximum level?\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tAt the turn of the century, the New York City-based quartet often hit that peak, making a name in their hometown and in Europe for their explosive live shows. The performances had the energy and verve of a Pentecostal revival, with James playing the role of charismatic preacher. The constant push-and-pull between the band and audience was electric, and it inspired their peers to raise the bar at their own shows.<\/p>\n \n\tBut while the Strokes, Interpol, and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs parlayed their New York hero status into career artists, the Mooney Suzuki, whose 1999 EP was heralded as a watershed moment for the scene, had the unfortunate fate of missing out on the boom. As Pitchfork<\/em><\/a> <\/em>put it in their 2006 review of the group\u2019s Maximum Black EP<\/em>, the band had the \u201cdubious distinction of arriving both too soon and too late for the turn-of-century garage rock windfall that should\u2019ve guaranteed they\u2019d never have to shop at a thrift store again.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tLess than 24 hours after their first performance on the Underground Garage boat, James and drummer Will Rockwell-Scott are conducting a postmortem of the previous night\u2019s gig, which opened with the rowdy \u201cSingin\u2019 a Song About Today.\u201d Clad in all black, James and the band cracked wise onstage with a brash, swashbuckling attitude, led constant clap-alongs, and took multiple sojourns into the crowd \u2014 and that was just during the first song. By the time they closed with \u201cYeah You Can,\u201d James was telling the cruisers how they\u2019re about to go \u201cdown down down,\u201d before adding a disclaimer: \u201cNot like the Titanic.\u201d<\/p>\n