.Louie Austen

If you find yourself liking William Shatner’s lounge-lizard Priceline commercials a little more than you should, Only Tonight is your bag, baby. Lest you think Louie Austen is some kind of joke — you should know that this guy is the real deal. An honest-to-god hotel bar legend who has lounged it up with Art Farmer, Ginger Davis, and Engelbert Humperdinck from New York to Vienna to Rio. Only Tonight is out on uber-hip German label Kitty-Yo, of course, so expect suave electronica stylings to go with Austen’s whiskey-smooth Sinatra vocals. The results are mixed, but often dazzling. “Only You” shines as a 21st-century disco anthem — imagine Sinatra getting down with Giorgio Moroder and Sqarepusher and you are getting close to how much this track swings. Several tracks could pass as straight Groovebox-produced bedroom electronica (most of the record is produced by Mario Neugebauer). “Grab My Shaft!” is a good example of how Austen mixes electronica with lounge humor; it’s a duet with fellow Kitty Yo slut Peaches, resulting in a sick triple-X South Beach dance floor anthem that manages to be both hilarious and sexual at the same time: “Eat Clit/Eat Dick/Come Quick/I’m a Sexual Conduit.” Yeah, it’s corny, but somehow it works. The same could be said for all of Only Tonight. Shatner wishes he could swing like Austen.