Local Hard Rock Outfit Packs SF Club

Rising from the ashes of the late, lamented Oakland outfit Annihilation Time, Lecherous Gaze mixes '60s garage-psych and '70s riff rock and blasts it out of a hardcore-punk cannon. Initially, the band featured Annihilation Time guitar hero Graham Clise, bassist Chris Grande and drummer Noel Sullivan working with singer Lakis Panagiotopulos, who fronted the group on it's debut EP for Tee Pee Records.

By the time Lecherous Gaze recorded its bracing first full-length album in 2012, new singer Zarayan Zaidi had brought his gruff Wolfman-Jack style growl to the proceedings. Opening track "Scorpion" simultaneously echoes Hendrix's "Stepping Stone," Love's "Seven and Seven Is" and Devo's "Gut Feeling," while "Babagazo" delivers the over-the-top bombast of a lost Dictators track.

Regular performances at Bay Area clubs and house parties anchored by the inventive, blues-flavored six-string pyrotechnics dealt out by guitarist Clise have made the group a local favorite. In 2014,  Lecherous Gaze issued Zeta Reticuli Blues, it's second acclaimed album for Tee Pee. It garnered another round of glowing reviews for the psychedelic punk savagery and fractured Chuck Berry riffs of "End Rising," "Animal Brain" and a ripping version of the oft-covered rock chestnut "Baby Please Don't Go."

While the band has yet to release a follow-up to that effort, Lecherous Gaze won't be accused of slacking off since it came out. In addition to trips through the U.S. and Europe to promote the record, last year the group added a second guitarist (Zach Dellorto-Blackwell) and toured extensively in the Far East, playing shows in Australia,  Malaysia, Thaialand, Singapore and Indonesia. Fans in Australia also got treated to the first Annihilation Time performance since the band split (though San Francisco supporters did get to see the group play a few songs during the encore of a Lecherous Gaze gig at the El Rio; another reunion show has been announced in Austin, TX this summer). The band promises to preview new material from its forthcoming third album when they headline the Hemlock Tavern on Friday night. They'll be joined by regular tour mates Dirty Fences (who hail from Brooklyn) and SF outfit Dancer.

Lecherous Gaze
Friday, April 22, 8:30 p.m. $10
Hemlock Tavern