Chris Isaak has written hits and performed in films, yet remains rooted in his music.

Sixty-something Stockton native Chris Isaak is a man content to remain frozen in musical time. “I listen to music up to like 1968,” he says. “I really don’t know much about modern pop at all.”

He uses musical devices more akin to the ’50s and ’60s than our era, like big reverb and tremolo guitar effects as well rocking a Frankie Valli-style vocal falsetto. Often called the Roy Orbison of the ’90s, he’s regularly compared to Elvis, Duane Eddy and even Ricky Nelson.

Isaak revels in a chameleonic musical persona: part broken-hearted crooner, a sometimes amusing singer-songwriter, and a dash of rockabilly rebel. When he appears at Golden State Theatre Nov. 14, he brings years of favorite songs and a persona fit for Hollywood. Despite all of this, his lyrical subjects remain fairly constant: love, loss and heartbreak. He displays well-developed cleverness with equal doses of cynicism and self-deprecation.

“I’ve always thought of myself as a lousy guitar player,” Isaak said to Las Vegas Magazine in 2016. “But then I think, you know, give me another 20 or 30 years and I might just get better.”

Isaak’s trademarks are an effortless delivery, musky baritone, heartthrob good looks and his stylish brand of retro-cool. His fondness for Orbison exudes.

“What a sweet guy Roy was,” Isaak says. “We opened for him one time and after the show I said to him, ‘I don’t know if I write hits or not,’ and he said, ‘You write hits, you just don’t know it.’ It was exactly what I needed to hear at the time.”

As if his decades-long platinum-selling musical career wasn’t enough, Isaak has also been an actor, and not just a dabbling one. Legendary cult director David Lynch took a liking to Isaak’s sparse early ballad “Wicked Game” and used it his dark film Wild At Heart.

After “Wicked Game” went Top Ten in 1991, noted cult photographer Herb Ritts directed Isaak in a steamy video on a beach with a topless Helena Christensen, which made him an instant star. Lynch also gave Isaak a role in the film Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me. He also appeared inMarried to the Mob, Silence of the Lambs and That Thing You Do. Showtime came knocking and Isaak starred in his own critically acclaimed cable TV series from 2001 to 2004.

“‘Wicked Game’ really put us out there,” Isaak says. “We were on the road at the time, and we got to ditch our van and get into a bus. For the first time in years, we actually got some sleep!”

CHRIS ISAAK: HOLIDAY TOUR 2018 8pm Wednesday, Nov. 14. Golden State Theatre, 417 Alvarado St. Monterey. $53-$108; $250 meet-and-greet. 649-1070, goldenstatetheatre.com