Orangegoose affirms its rock character – and makes its Monterey debut – at the Mucky Duck.

A cassette recording of original folk tunes is Jawsh Anderson’s only connection to his singer-songwriter father he never had a chance to know, since his father was killed in a car crash when Anderson was just a year old.

He learned how to play every song on that tape. He spent so much time with the songs, it fact, it could’ve been construed as an obsession.

Eventually – and recently – he came to the point where he realized that something he held so closely might also be holding him back.

“Last year I had to put [my father’s] ghost to rest,” Anderson says. “As his son, I had to confront the fact that he struggled with depression for most of his life and you can hear it in his songs.”

It was time to stop reaching back and start reaching up, making his own music and referring to his father’s songs only as a beacon to guide him on his own path.

“There’s no question that my life – and music – will continue to be directed in some fashion by [my father’s] legacy,” Anderson says, “but I had to let go of the power he’s had over my identity and try to stand in my own two shoes.”

The decision to define his own, more rock-driven sound triggered a move from Seattle, where he had been trying to make it as a solo singer-songwriter in the folky vein favored by his father.

He returned to his native Santa Cruz and reconnected with guitarist Ian Rydquist and drummer Rodney Trujillo, who along with Anderson fantasized about getting a band together in junior high, even naming themselves Orangegoose and getting T-shirts made. The only problem then: None could play an instrument.

By the time their paths crossed again in 2013, they had all learned how, and since they already had a band name, they were halfway home. Local bassist Zane Bock, who happens to be legally blind, was the final piece.

“We’re in this Beatles White Album phase where we’re marrying hard and soft,” Anderson explains. “It’s like taking ‘Helter Skelter’ and ‘Blackbird’ and finding something in between.”

Orangegoose has a repertoire of 25 original songs and they’re finding themselves with every new note. “Point Break” is an ethereal funk odyssey, with hints of Phish’s “Divided Sky,” that gathers clumps of distorted momentum. The ’70s classic rock throwback “Mothership” guides its riffs to place we’ve been before, and enjoy revisiting.

On Saturday, as the quartet plays those songs and makes its Peninsula debut at the Mucky Duck, it’ll mark a key step for Anderson along his own, well-lit road.

ORANGEGOOSE plays 9pm Saturday, Feb. 8, at the Mucky Duck, 479 Alvarado St., Monterey. Free. 655-3031.

HEAR MORE HERE >> www.reverbnation.com/orangegoose