Roger Clyne really rocks the Big Easy

If you take a peek at the current Billboard charts – seemingly dominated by performers of hip-hop (Usher and Nelly) or hick-pop (Tim McGraw and Alan Jackson) – you might wonder whether rock ‘n’ roll is dead.

Fear not – it’s under the name Roger Clyne and The Peacemakers, who play tonight at the Big Easy Concert House.

“I don’t think good ol’ rock ‘n’ roll is dead or dying,” says Clyne, an Arizona native, in a phone interview. “I think there will always be a market for what I do – putting wood to wire. But even if in 10 years I’m playing a recorder, it’ll still be rock ‘n’ roll at heart.”

You would expect such comments from Clyne, an artist who has shucked many of the accepted notions of the music industry after watching it devour his first band, The Refreshments.

The Refreshments, with Clyne as their frontman, scored a hit with the pop-anthem “Banditos,” from the 1996 release, “Fizzy Fuzzy Big & Buzzy” in 1996. Clyne also made a name for himself when he wrote the twangy guitar jingle on FOX’s popular sitcom “King of the Hill.”

But by their third album in 1997, Clyne and The Refreshments called it quits, citing growing pressures from their label to replicate “Banditos”-era success. Since ditching major-label status, Clyne has embraced a looser, yet more energetic roots-rock approach with his Peacemakers – all four of their releases since 1999’s “Honky Tonk Union” come off like a Springsteenian romp through the vast Arizona desert.

The formula has worked. Since then, they have become a reckoning force in the world of independent music and roots-rock. All four of their independent releases have debuted in the Top 10 of Billboard’s Internet Sales charts, making them the only group to accomplish that.

Their most recent album, “¡Americano!” released in January, debuted in the Top 20 of six Billboard charts, including No. 1 in Internet Sales and Top Mountain Region Sales.

Roger Clyne and The Peacemakers’ Web site also has become one the strongest online communities in music, garnering nearly 9 million hits a month and a site membership that outdoes larger names such as Tori Amos.