Kevin Bronson on September 14th, 2018

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Trad is rad. Right?

Certainly seemed so Thursday night at the Highland Park Ebell Club, where Gold Star celebrated the release of their third album (in just over three years), “Uppers & Downers.” The vision of singer-songwriter Marlon Rabenreither, Gold Star sails down the rutted asphalt of 1960s and ’70s classic rock, rolling on wheels that aren’t reinvented, merely turning smoothly.

Fronting an ace five-piece band (plus guitar whiz and opening act Harrison Whitford for the final two songs), Rabenreither sang with deep longing from the karmic space occupied over history by countless restless troubadours — the music recalls the Stones, if the Stones had channeled Beat poets.

That distinct point of view in Rabenreither’s storytelling — and the Los Angeles threads in many of those vignettes — gave Thursday’s concert a sepia-toned feel, accented by the fact that the show was in an echo-laden hall in a 1912 building. Your uncle who says he went to Woodstock but has never shown you the ticket stub would have loved it. You could relate, too, if you know the neighborhood in Gold Star’s “Chinatown;” or have lived through the title track’s “Uppers & Downers” (which Rabenreither performed solo accompanied by harmonium); or have found yourself in Echo Park unhappy nearly “Half the Time;” or know someone who’s been crushed “Beneath the Wheels” of life in the fast lane.

In all, Gold Star ended up playing 10 songs from the new album and three from 2017’s “Big Blue.”

Whitford started the night accompanied by backup vocalist (and recent Bootleg Theater resident) Johanna Samuels, playing 30 minutes of mesmerizing mopery, coaxing emotion out of both his voice and his electric guitar. Besides his originals, Whitford performed a crushing version of Elliott Smith’s “King’s Crossing.” (The Bootleg, by the way, will host a Samuels-curated Elliott Smith Tribute in October, the 15th anniversary of the songwriter’s passing).

Shannon Lay followed Whitford with a chillingly good solo performance of songs from her two full-lengths — warm acoustic guitar, clarion vocals and a heart-stopping cover of Karen Dalton’s “Something on Your Mind.”

Gold Star setlist: Crooked Teeth, Does It Ever Get You Down?, St. Vincent De Paul’s, Sonny’s Blues, Beneath the Wheels, Baby Face, This Is the Year, Dani’s in Love, Get It Together (C’mon), Blue Sky to Blue Sky, Uppers & Downers, Chinatown, Half the Time.