AUSTIN, TEXAS

With Austin playing host to bands from around the world during South by Southwest two weeks ago, Continental Club owner Steve Wertheimer sounded especially proud to introduce an Austin group that has taken on the world over the past two years. Never mind that they've yet to land in a Twin Cities club.

"We're thrilled to have them back where they started," Wertheimer said.

"Aw, Steve, you're gonna bring a tear to my eye," Black Joe Lewis murmured as he stepped onstage. Within seconds, though, the 28-year-old singer/guitarist started hollering into the microphone, his sentimentality gone in a burst of horns and blues-punk guitar grinding, courtesy of his mighty band, the Honeybears.

Two hours later, one of the best new live bands to break out of Austin and/or SXSW in the past decade had staked out an even bigger buzz for itself -- this time with more of a hard-rocking wallop, also heard on the septet's new sophomore album, "Scandalous." Imagine Muddy Waters meeting Wilson Pickett in a Texas punk-rock bar, and you'll get an idea of what the buzz is about.

Talking a few days later, Lewis said the punchier sound can be credited to all the touring the band did since breaking out of SXSW in 2009. It opened for everyone from Dave Matthews to the New York Dolls to Spoon (whose drummer, Jim Eno, produced both Honeybears discs).

Of all these tours, Lewis said, the band's favorite was probably the lowest-profile outing, with Mississippi bluesmen Cedric Burnside & Lightnin' Malcolm. "They're about as close to the source as you get," he said. He also talked admiringly of the Matthews trek, which brought his band to Xcel Energy Center last September.

"It was impressive to see this whole fleet of buses and semis all working for one band, and here we come, all of us crammed in our van."

Although eager to finally play the Cities as a headliner Sunday at the Cedar Cultural Center, Lewis was not shy about stating the poor impression he got of Minnesota in his midteens, when his mom took a job through IBM that brought him to Rochester for about a year: "I hated it," he said. "Too much snow, and there were as many rednecks up there as there are here in Texas."

Lewis talked with the same kind of candor about some of the songs on "Scandalous." True to the title, these aren't tunes you're likely to hear on the Disney Channel.

The shout-and-response-filled single "Booty City," for instance, was inspired by a visit to an area of Washington, D.C., that Lewis said is heavily populated by Ethiopian-Americans. "Me and the bassist Bill [Stevenson] gave it that nickname after we got a look at some of those women," he said, shaking his head.

One of the album's grittiest (and best) tracks, "Mustang Ranch," pays homage to an infamous brothel outside Reno. What sounds like a pretty clever piece of fiction is actually a true recap of the Honeybears' effort to get their "hams glazed" during a long cross-country trek.

"It pretty much happened the way it's told in the song," Lewis said. "But we learned pretty quick the place wasn't for us. When we walked in, it was like one of those scenes from a movie where someone walks into a saloon, the music stops and everybody turns and looks at them."

Lewis was blunt again when it came to explaining the origin of his nickname (come on, it's not often you hear a black dude called "Black So-and-So"). It started as something of a joke but stuck around "because I like being black, and I like [messing] with people about it." When asked about the Stax Records-like balance of black and white musicians in his band, he said, "It's not something we've ever really thought of. Honestly, the only time it comes up is when we're talking to white journalists." (He made that comment with the same sly smile he shows onstage when he's egging on the crowd.)

The Honeybears' powerhouse drummer, Matthew Strmiska, said Lewis applies a direct approach to leading the band, too. "He knows what he wants, and he's not afraid to push us hard," Strmiska said. "And you never know exactly what he's going to want. It might be some hard soul or blues number one minute, then he'll have us covering a punk-rock song next."

A native of the Austin area, Lewis didn't get started as a musician until he was 20 and working at a pawnshop. He said, "I took a guitar down off the wall and just started learning by playing around. Austin is a great town for that."

Getting to "play around" remains the cornerstone of his music, it seems.

"We're still real proud of the first album, but we picked up so much from touring, I think it's inevitable the second one is that much better," he said. "It makes us all that more excited for what's to come."

BLACK JOE LEWIS & THE HONEYBEARS

• With: Those Darlins.
• When: 8 p.m. Sun.
• Where: Cedar Cultural Center, 416 Cedar Av. S., Mpls.
• Tickets: $15. All ages. www.TheCedar.org.