Los Angeles’ Little Joy, playing the Duck Room Saturday, combines Latin rhythms with edgy groves evoking vintage 1950s pop and tropicalia. This could be one of those ’should have been there’ shows of the year. Strokes drummer Fabrizio Moretti is a member of the band, named after an L.A. watering hole.

Here’s how Rolling Stone reviewed their self-titled debut album out now on Rough Trade.

Little Joy (4 out of 5 stars)

Along with Albert Hammond Jr.’s restless solo career, Fabrizio Moretti’s new band suggests that Strokes side projects are an astonishingly great idea. Named for an L.A. cocktail lounge and sounding like one, the trio are fronted by Rodrigo Amarante, a polyglot Brazilian rocker who comes off like a languid Julian Casablancas. Binki Shapiro is the group’s Nico, adding delicate vocals and glockenspiel to the lullaby-ish “Don’t Watch Me Dancing” and the reggae-inflected “The Next Time Around.” With Moretti on guitars, drums and backing vocals, the vibe is closing time at the Beachcomber: songs that conjure mid-20th-century pop with Jamaican, Hawaiian and bossa nova flavors. Like Vampire Weekend, it’s indie rock getting its global groove on.

LITTLE JOY with Radical Sons and Dead Trees

Members: Rodrigo Amarante (of Los Hermanos) Fabrizio Moretti (of The Strokes) and Binki Shapiro

Doors 8 pm • Show 9 pm, $10

http://www.myspace.com/littlejoymusic