xAxNxDx.

It looks like gibberish, but it stands for ”Tiger Army Never Die.” Translated into punk rock lingo, the x’s are periods.

It’s also the way Nick 13, main man of the Los Angeles band Tiger Army, signs off most of his blog entries on the group’s Myspace page at myspace.com/tiger army.

After 10 years as the leader of Tiger Army, Nick 13 takes his band very seriously; you can hear it in his voice. The guy speaks very deliberately, often taking long pauses to carefully think through what he’s about to say.

It’s as if he’s pouring every bit of himself into each word he utters. That’s an approach he also takes with his music.

”It’s basically my whole life,” he said in a telephone interview from his home in L.A. ”Sometimes to the exclusion of all else.”

Tiger Army, which will play Sunday in Bend (see ”If You Go”) plays music that is rooted in punk, but with heavy influence from 1950s rock ‘n’ roll, particularly rockabilly. Out front, Nick 13 sings about love and loss in a familiar warble that is as much Morrissey as it is Elvis Presley.

Bassist Jeff Roffredo and drummer James Meza have ably handled the rhythmic duties for Tiger Army for the last couple of years, but it is Nick 13, who declined to reveal his age, who has devoted the last decade of his life to the group. He grew up in Ukiah, Calif., a rural town about two hours from San Francisco, and the band played its first gig at the legendary punk club 924 Gilman Street in Berkeley in early 1996.

In 2000, Nick 13 moved south to L.A. with one Tiger Army album under his belt; an album that had been labeled ”psychobilly” after the revved-up version of rockabilly that had grown popular in Europe. There wasn’t much of a psychobilly scene in the City of Angels, Nick 13 said, but there was an openness to the style among L.A. punks.

”The subculture of punk is so established here and it’s a thing that spans generations,” he said. ”That and the fact that roots music (like) American rockabilly (and 1950s rock ‘n’ roll) is more remembered and more appreciated here relative to other parts of the country.

”Even though people weren’t aware of the psychobilly scene per se, it was just more fertile ground for people to understand and relate to what we do,” he said.

Fans flocked to the band’s shows after the 2001 release of Tiger Army’s second record, ”II: Power Of Moonlite,” which was followed by 18 months of touring, including treks to Japan and Europe. Then, Nick 13 threw a curveball with 2004’s ”III: Ghost Tigers Rise,” a record that veered away slightly from the psychobilly sound.

The album was a bit slower and a little more nuanced, giving the bandleader space to showcase the subtleties of his songs. The change annoyed some psychobilly fans, but others drew even closer to the band, which continued attracting crowds as it toured Europe and Australia and then embarked on its first headlining tour across America.

That tour ended in May of 2005 with five sold-out shows at the House of Blues in Hollywood. After holing up to write for a fourth album, Tiger Army then sold out four nights in a row in February at the House of Blues in Anaheim.

Nine sold-out shows at two Southern California venues for a band that, let’s be honest, most people haven’t heard of? That’s a testament to the devotion of Tiger Army’s fans, a devotion stoked by Nick 13’s intensely personal style of songwriting.

In return, many have permanently pledged their allegiance to the band. A quick tour of tiger army.com reveals about 80 photos sent in by fans of their Tiger Army-related tattoos, some of the band’s tiger/bat hybrid logo, some inspired by lyrics, and more than a dozen incorporating the words ”never die.”

The photos represent just a fraction of the ”hundreds” of Tiger Army tattoos Nick 13 sees on the road, he said. Each one is a ”huge compliment” because it shows just how much his band means to its fans, he said.

”I think basically the music is coming from a really honest, personal place that speaks to people who hear something that touches them and that they relate to and I do think that’s relatively rare these days,” he said. ”In response, there’s a real dedication from the people who appreciate what we do. I think they see how much goes into it.”