Plastic Parachute

By Eric W. Saeger

published: November 29, 2007

Kicking off Friday's Suenalo Sound System show at Jazid are Deb Hooks's do-me pumps. Um, I mean Plastic Parachute. The alt-pop quartet is a road-dog-and-a-half, doing about 250 shows per year. As time has gone on, the band has padded its resumé with opening slots for heavies such as The Fray, Nelly Furtado, Deborah Harry, and the Go-Gos. Further, the group has stumbled upon a few oddball background spots for Jeep commercials and Time Warner Extreme Ski Films.

With uncounted flashes of semi-fame like those, these bandmates are obviously from L.A. Their roots, so they tell the half-paying-attention, are in a small Oklahoma town, but that's a bullshit story to keep chitchat to a minimum. They're actually from various towns in the Texas panhandle, a wide-open space that nevertheless wasn't big enough to contain their dreams.

The band's songs borrow from bouncy, big-time acts old and new — a little Motels here, some Garbage there, Gwen Stefani and Pat Benatar sprinkled in the marinade. Singer Deb Hooks envelops herself in a precocious little quasi-fashionazi trip, plastering her MySpace pages with fabulous glamour pics featuring styles from the Fifties to today. See a Doris Day leg shot embedded next to one of a micro-clad Twiggy on a bicycle.

The band's first full-length LP, Elephants & Giraffes, was released in September on its own label, WIPP Records. "Houdini," a song from the previous EP, Swell, has done well, winning airplay on sundry network TV shows and MTV.