Try hard to erase the vision of Ned Beatty being forced to disrobe after a hillbilly squawks from his mangled pie-hole, “You got a Purty Mouth!” That kind of in-bred dirty-South stereotype is generally what surrounds country music, but Seattle has been bursting at the britches with southern fried musicians that Shanghai the genre from KMPS and Toby Keith. Purty Mouth play up the humor of the stereotype with their entertaining lyrics, but never let the joke railroad their polished handle on their particular brand of country-tonk. Even though it may appear campy to a barfly in-between swigs of beer, that’s all just part of the act. Frontman Mikey Budd, clad in a signature cowboy hat, bellows out lyrics like: “He’s a preacher with an ipod and a Wi-Fi for Jesus,” backed by the honeysuckle voices of Lori Ramon and Alyssa Keene. Southbound Union provide excellent accompaniment to Purty Mouth, with their like-minded, harmony-rich honky tonk sound. For those of you that think that country music has slid into the dredges of knee-slapping, three-toothed religious yokels, never to return, check yourself into the Highway 99 Blues Club for another type of deliverance.

Wed., Aug. 20, 8:30 p.m., 2008