Sunday, June 4, 2006 | 7:40 a.m.
Sha Na Na, the group that has done as much as anyone to keep rock 'n' roll from the '50s and '60s alive, has released a new CD - filled with new, original songs.
"But it still sounds like Sha Na Na," said drummer John 'Jocko' Marcellino, who was among the musicians who founded the nostalgia group 38 years ago. "We specifically went after that - it sounds like an oldies album."
The CD, "One More Saturday Night," is on Pat Boone's Gold Label.
The musicians will appear at Tower Records, 4580 W. Sahara Ave., at 7 p.m. on Thursday for the release of the CD, then will perform June 9-11 at the Suncoast.
Marcellino, speaking by phone from his La Jolla, Calif., home, said Sha Na Na is as popular as ever. The group keeps being re-discovered, he said.
"It keeps going in cycles," he said. "Today a lot of high school kids are listening to oldies stations - it's just interesting to me that it comes in cycles."
The group's performance repertoire includes a variety of music from the era, not just rock 'n' roll, but gospel, blues, rockabilly and others.
"We go out of our way to cover it all," Marcellino said.
They're a show band that also includes a lot of comedy in their performances.
"It's not just the music," Marcellino said. "It's about the performance - singers, dancers, actors. It's an eight-man circus we keep hitting you with."
Sha Na Na was formed in New York City in 1969.
"We played at Woodstock just before Jimi Hindrix went on," Marcellino said.
After Woodstock, Sha Na Na began performing at colleges.
They later had a syndicated TV show on NBC for four years, which appeared in re-runs for four years after it went off the air.
In the middle of all that, they were in "Grease" (the Broadway and film productions), which kept them in the public eye.
They and their music never seem to grow old.
"I'm 56, but I look much younger," Marcellino said. "I still have a lot of hair I can grease. This show keeps us young. It's crazy."
Marcellino says Vegas is one of the group's homes away from home.
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