![\"Joe](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/JKC.jpg\")
Joe \u201cKing\u201d Carrasco poses during a stop on his tour of war-torn Ukraine. Credit: Courtesy Photo \/ Joe \u201cKing\u201d Carrasco<\/p>\nJoe \u201cKing\u201d Carrasco poses during a stop on his tour of war-torn Ukraine. Credit: Courtesy Photo \/ Joe \u201cKing\u201d Carrasco<\/p>\n
Joe \u201cKing\u201d Carrasco, known for a sound that fused party-ready Tex-Mex with garage rock and new wave, has ridden a wild 50-year career.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Texas-bred singer-songwriter leveraged a recording with San Antonio musical legends at the city\u2019s now-defunct Zaz Studios into rock \u2019n\u2019 roll cult status, becoming a hot touring commodity and singing a duet with Michael Jackson. He even appeared in multiple movies and TV shows and relocated to Nicaragua at one point to live with the Sandinistas. \u00a0<\/p>\n
But his most recent endeavor might be his most impressive \u2014 and risky \u2014\u00a0yet.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Carrasco staged a rock \u2019n\u2019 roll tour across war-torn Ukraine last year, raising money for emergency vehicles in the wake of the country\u2019s devastating invasion by Russian forces. The life-or-death situation lent an intensity to the shows, he told the Current.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cUkraine is like Texas, man,\u201d Carrasco said. \u201cIt\u2019s like Austin back in 1980 at Club Foot. It\u2019s crazy but it\u2019s fun. Playing there is so much fun, because they need it. They\u2019re excited and they\u2019re not jaded.\u201d<\/p>\n
Together with Hartewick Circus, a group of 20-something rockers from the UK, Carrasco embarked his Ukrainian tour last June, becoming the first foreign rock band to do road dates there since the Russians invaded in early 2022.\u00a0<\/p>\n
By night, the entourage packed in eight dates at clubs in L\u2019viv, Kharkiv, Dnipro, Ternopil\u2019, Vinnytsia, and Kyiv. During the day, they played in hospitals and schools.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe want people to be aware World War III is here,\u201d Carrasco said. \u201cThe Ukrainians, they\u2019re defending Europe. The Russians are evil, man. I\u2019ve seen what they\u2019ve done \u2014\u00a0been to the cemeteries, been to the funerals.\u201d<\/p>\n
Major publications in Europe have written about Carrasco\u2019s tour, including an extensive feature in The Guardian, but back home, it\u2019s largely been greeted with radio silence. In large part, Ukraine\u2019s struggle has been pushed out of the headlines by the war in Gaza, ICE raids and President Trump\u2019s increasingly outlandish antics.<\/p>\n
While back in Texas, Carrasco continued raising funds for more vehicles. Since Russian drones have repeatedly targeted emergency vehicles, he\u2019s helping the country buy mini-vans less likely to trigger a Russian attack. His tour and fundraising also helped raise money to assist homeless and injured dogs \u2014\u00a0another of Carrasco\u2019s passions.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cOur goal is to raise money to buy vehicles for the front, cars to take the wounded back to the medics,\u201d Carrasco said. \u201cEach car saves 40 lives. Last tour, we brought two cars, so we saved 80 lives.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2018I go where the energy is\u2019<\/p>\n
Beyond the sensation of doing good, Carrasco was buoyed by the enthusiasm of the crowds.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s mostly women because the men are out on the front,\u201d he said. \u201cThe first show, you knew you were in a war zone, because in the middle of the show, a guy auctioned off a 50-caliber machine gun belt, like Pancho Villa. You\u2019re playing and the place is intense, but the people are dancing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ukrainians are determined to party like there\u2019s no tomorrow, Carrasco said, because they know there might not be. Tex-Mex music also was quite the novelty in a Ukrainian war zone.<\/p>\n
\u201cLike tequila in Mexico, they drink a lot of vodka,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
Naturally, touring was difficult in a war zone.\u00a0<\/p>\n
For one, Carrasco and the band had to use burner phones, since Russian intelligence can trace normal cell signals and use them to target bombs to the area the communication is coming from.<\/p>\n
In a world of cynical marketing and phony rebellion, it\u2019s heartening to see a musician actually risk their life to make a difference. It\u2019s about as punk rock as it gets.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a circuit, 10 or 15 places to play \u2014\u00a0a tour!\u201d Carrasco said. \u201cFolks are dancing, and it\u2019s nice to see that energy. I\u2019m not getting it here. It\u2019s more subdued. Over there, it\u2019s like back to the \u201980s \u2014 it\u2019s more intense. \u2026 I go where the energy is.\u201d<\/p>\n
San Antonio Connection<\/p>\n
Like so much in Carrasco\u2019s life, the Ukraine tour happened because he was willing to follow the energy \u2014\u00a0wherever it led. That same go-with-the-flow approach landed Carrasco at Zaz Studios on West Commerce Street in 1976 to record with the cr\u00e8me de la cr\u00e8me of San Antonio musicians.<\/p>\n
Born Joe Teutsch in the tiny town of Dumas, Carrasco moved to San Francisco as a teen, then returned to Texas, still trying to dial in his sound as a musician and songwriter. Then, in 1973, after catching San Antonio icon Doug Sahm perform at Austin\u2019s Soap Creek Saloon, Carrasco found his musical North Star.<\/p>\n
Like Sahm, Carrasco was exploring a high-energy coupling of Tex-Mex with rock \u2019n\u2019 roll.<\/p>\n
\u201cDoug was the coolest thing that ever walked into Austin,\u201d Carrasco recalled. \u201cThere was either the Willie Nelson thing or the Rusty Weir thing, but Doug Sahm had soul. That cool San Antonio thing. That\u2019s where I was at, because I was playing Tex-Mex.\u201d<\/p>\n
Carrasco was performing with Shorty y Los Corvettes at the time \u2014 Tejano icons in their own right \u2014 but he was looking to strike on his own. After teaming up with the late Speedy Sparks, Carrasco connected with a cadre of San Antonio musicians, including the drummers Richard \u201cEh Eh\u201d Elizondo and Ernie Durawa.\u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n
Both Sparks and Durawa later went on to perform as backing musicians for the Texas Tornados, the supergroup that included Sahm.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cRichard was the striptease drummer of San Antonio,\u201d Carrasco said. \u201cHe was the Penguin \u2014\u00a0he had four fingers, and he\u2019d say, \u2018Gimme four.\u2019 And Ernie, well, he was a pro, like a rock \u2019n\u2019 roll pro. And all of a sudden, it was a real band.\u201d<\/p>\n
At Durawa\u2019s urging, Carrasco booked a recording date at Zaz. At the time, the studio offered a special deal: $250 to record a single and press the vinyl on a machine in the garage.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere was a garage with a dirt floor,\u201d Carrasco said. \u201cAll these pressers making albums, 20 or 30 of \u2019em, on this dirt floor \u2026 . I\u2019d never seen how a record was made.\u201d \u00a0<\/p>\n
After convening at Zaz and rehearsing at nearby Chano\u2019s Dugout Restaurant, Elizondo and Durawa began calling in the best SA players, including Augie Meyers, Charlie McBurney and Rocky Morales.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt took 27 cases of beer, a lot of weed and those guys were eating bennies, you know, benzedrine,\u201d Carrasco said. \u201cAnd we had a single!\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
At Elizondo\u2019s urging, Carrasco named the band El Molino \u2014\u00a0and a legend was was born. \u00a0<\/p>\n
![\"\u201cI](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Courtesy-Photo-Joe-King-Carrasco_.jpg\")
\u201cI don\u2019t do this to get rich or be a pop star,\u201d Carrasco said of his Ukraine tour. \u201cI gave up on that. Credit: Courtesy Photo \/ Joe “King” Carrasco<\/p>\n
The album would go on to become an essential document of San Antonio\u2019s West Side Sound.\u00a0 Meyers put out the release through his Texas Re-Cord label, and it came out on Big Beat\/Chiswick in England. Elvis Costello was an early supporter.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey released it, and Elvis Costello had a radio show and started playing it,\u201d Carrasco said.\u00a0 \u201cHe was starting to get big, so that\u2019s how I got on the radar.\u201d<\/p>\n
If El Molino put Carrasco on the radar, it was his next band \u2014 Joe King Carrasco and the Crowns \u2014 that put him through the stratosphere \u2014\u00a0at least for a while. The band had a surprise hit with the song \u201cParty Weekend,\u201d and next came MTV videos, a major label record deal, worldwide touring and decades of Tex-Mex rock \u2019n\u2019 roll. \u00a0<\/p>\n
Carrasco may not be packing the same venues he used to, but he\u2019s still cranking out the Tex-Mex sound he\u2019d captured so long ago on West Commerce Street.<\/p>\n
Life-or-death intensity<\/p>\n
Fast\u2013forward nearly 50 years, and Carrasco, now in his early 70s, still thrives on an energy that\u2019s pure rock \u2019n\u2019 roll. In part, he\u2019s getting it by playing adjacent to Ukrainian battlefields. The life-or-death intensity is exhilarating.\u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t do this to get rich or be a pop star,\u201d Carrasco said. \u201cI gave up on that. That\u2019s what we\u2019re doing: saving dogs and saving lives in Ukraine. Fighting Russians.\u00a0 It\u2019s strange \u2014\u00a0something I never thought I\u2019d do. But I\u2019ve seen what the Russians do. Every night at 9 o\u2019clock, the whole country has a moment of silence. And every morning a funeral. So intense.\u201d<\/p>\n
Carrasco also maintains an intensity outside his affinity for Ukraine. He maintains a busy touring schedule with frequent stops across Texas, France and Mexico. He may have fallen off the national radar, but his music is still vital and vibrant \u2014\u00a0a blast of puro SA garage-rock energy. \u00a0<\/p>\n
The performer also released a recently unearthed recording of his band at its ultimate peak: Danceteria Deluxe, a snapshot captured in New York City in 1980. It\u2019s a timeless document of pure party music, serving up an intoxicating mix of early B-52s, the Sir Douglas Quintet and ? and the Mysterians.<\/p>\n
As of his last correspondence with the Current, Carrasco was holed up in the mountains above Puerto Vallarta, where he owns a bar. The recent cartel violence left him without electricity, he explained in a text message: \u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cHey Bill-been kinda crazy round here in Jalisco \ud83d\ude2c\ud83d\ude2c \u2014 \ud83d\ude4f\ud83d\ude4f no electricity yesterday \u2014 no internet \u2014\u00a0bridges blocked-burnin oxoxo stores \u2014 total lockdown everywhere \u2014 people staying inside no traffic \u2014 we are staying in the mountains \u2014\u00a0keeping our heads down\ud83d\ude4f\ud83d\ude4f\ud83c\udf35 \u2014 for now\ud83d\ude4f\ud83d\ude4f\ud83d\ude4f\ud83d\ude4f \u2014\u00a0will keep u posted\ud83d\ude4f\ud83d\ude4f\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
More evidence that for all his commitment to good times, Carrasco remains a fearless rock \u2019n\u2019 roll legend.<\/p>\n
Those wishing to donate to Carrasco\u2019s campaign to buy emergency vehicles for Ukraine can do so at missionaidforukraine.co.uk or at one of his shows.<\/p>\n
Sign Up for SA Current newsletters.<\/a><\/p>\n Follow us:\u00a0Apple News<\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0Google News<\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0NewsBreak<\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0Reddit<\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0Instagram<\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0Facebook\u00a0<\/a>| Twitter<\/a>\u00a0| Or sign up for our\u00a0RSS Feed<\/a><\/p>\n Related Stories<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t \n\t\t\t\t\tThe San Antonio-tied musician staged a rock \u2019n\u2019 roll tour across war-torn Ukraine last year, raising money for the country to buy more emergency vehicles.\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
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