Discover Exotica Music With Intoxika!

Intoxika Brings Exotica Alive at La Mariana

By Jamie Winpenny

The La Mariana Sailing Club hosts the Latin jazz and exotica trio Intoxika every Monday. It’s an outstanding ensemble, featuring three accomplished Honolulu musicians who each have illustrious careers of their own outside of the trio.

But first, a little about the legendary La Mariana itself.

Thomas MacKay, Ernie Provencher, and Augie “Lopaka” Colon Jr. weave their sonic tropical voodoo sounds at the La Mariana Tiki Bar & Restaurant in Honolulu. (Honolulu Vibes photo by Ronen Zilberman)

The humble establishment may be the epicenter of a tiki subculture that has made its way and entrenched itself aroundthe world. On the surface, tiki culture is by definition “kitschy.” Beyond the tropes of carved tiki gods and lavish tropical drinks, however, lies something more ephemeral and ultimately fulfilling than a tired pop culture cliché. La Mariana is, perhaps, the original manifestation of that something.

It has been featured in television institutions like Hawaii 5-0(the original and reboot), Magnum P.I.¸ and a host of Hollywood movies and album covers. The opening of Don the Beachcomber in Hollywood in 1933 is rightly credited with starting the tiki phenomenon. But La Mariana is the non-ironic embodiment of that spirit.

La Mariana Sailing Club Honolulu, HI, 2019. (Honolulu Vibes photo by Ronen Zilberman)

La Mariana opened in 1957. It’s located in the heart of industrial Honolulu at Keehi Lagoon, far from the languid, lapping shores of Waikiki beach and the on-holiday milieu that tiki culture seeks to emulate. Tucked behind a warehouse off Sand Island Access Road, La Mariana may be accurately described as a shack. The smell of diesel and exhaust at Keehi is in the wind. It is not the kind of place that anyone would happen to stumble across. It is a destination.

La Mariana is where Intoxika works their tropical sonic voodoo. It’s a singular fortune to hear the three-piece deep textures. This speaks to the stellar caliber of musicianship shared by the members of the outfit.

Percussionist Augie “Lopaka” Colon, Jr. is the scion of a Hawaiian music dynasty. Towering over an array of congas, bongos, maracas, chimes, and Hawaiian percussion instruments like the ‘ipu, Colon is as integral to Vibra Cubana’s sound as the dulcet tones conjured by dreadlocked vibraphonist Thomas MacKay. Stand-up bassist Ernie Provencher alternates between fingerstyle and the bow. The result is a stunningly orchestral sound that seems unlikely from such sparse instrumentation.

Combined with La Mariana’s intrinsically authentic atmosphere, Intoxika provides a truly immersive experience. It is one that is enjoyed by a clientele that is equal parts visitor and local. A recent Monday evening saw old salts, likely harbor slip-holders, slouched over their phones at the bar as incredulous and obvious tourists captured the experience with devices of their own.

Diners fill-up the atmospheric tiki lounge to enjoy food, drink, and live music on a Monday night.

When the band tore into an inspired exotica version of “Tequila”, a little boy in an obnoxious aloha shirt that matched his parents’ tore up the dancefloor in a frenzy of joyous abandon. The scene was reflected in the large mirror behind the band, with twinkling lights stretching into and out of a pastiche of the warm colors of a sunset in paradise. Medicine ball-sized glass orbs, translucent blue and green vestiges of a long abandoned maritime and fishing tradition, swayed in the breeze coming off the lagoon. They danced with the flicker of the tiki torches that stand sentinel throughout La Mariana.

Added to the atmosphere that night was the savory smell of teriyaki and fresh fish, perhaps caught by one of the old men at the bar that very day. That is to say: the food at La Mariana is truly local and very much a part of the Intoxika /La Mariana experience.

An unbiased review of Intoxika and/or La Mariana would include downsides. This, however, is not a review. It’s a testimonial. There are no downsides.

Sample the sounds of Intoxika :

by Erica McMillan