Tonio K.'s Tunes and Tortillas

[Los Angeles Times, March 11, 1988]

Tonio K. once seemed like an angrier Warren Zevon: long on acid, almost misanthropic humor and short on sensitivity - not the kind of guy you'd figure for a lengthy career. Well, five mostly neglected albums and 10 full years after his debut, he's still kicking.

But, fortunately for his mental health, the Tonio K. who played the Roxy on Wednesday is a far mellower and more well-rounded songwriter. Instead of singing his old venomous songs like "Life in the Foodchain" and "H-A-T-R-E-D," he's now, like T-Bone Burnett, a tough-minded, thinking Christian—a humanist cynic who's not afraid to show his soft underbelly. And like current Bruce Springsteen, he sees societal decay in the difficulties of modern romance and commitment.

And while his laconic, offhand manner doesn't place him in their league as a performer, Wednesday's 90-minute show was an entertaining resume from a witty songwriter whose current excursions into pop-funk and hard rock never stray too far from the musical mainstream. Though the set—drawn almost entirely from the new Notes from the Lost Civilization and 1986's Romeo Unchained—had its share of gritty rock, its real keynotes were anthemic love songs like "Without Love" and "Stay."

Does that mean Tonio K.'s lost some of his edge? Yeah, it does. At times, his performance could have dome with some of the vicious bite that was once his calling card. But all the same, the show itself was never slick, and Tonio battered at any implicit complacency in his recent material with the likes of his old stunt of throwing autographed tortillas into the audience and, more effectively, with the searing funk-metal riffs of guitarist (and Red Hot Chili Peppers alumnus) Jack Sherman.

And at the end of the evening, it was one of Tonio's big, sensitive songs that provided a tough, generous and moving finale. "You Will Go Free" (from Romeo Unchained) stares down the world's evils and dares to be optimistic. The largely acoustic version that finished off the Roxy show was the work of an artist with depths that simply didn't exist a decade ago.

—STEVE POND