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If color evokes emotion, then the Prowler should be eye candy for those who like gold. Inca Gold is a bright yellow metallic designed to evoke memories of candy-colored California hot rods.

The Prowler is, of course, a throwback to early American hot rods. Yet it embraces some of the latest technological advances in the manufacture of the automobile. It is the most aluminum-intensive car built and puts magnesium, urethane, and polymers to work as well. It comes with an all-aluminum overhead-cam V6, rather than the iron overhead-valve V8s used in traditional hot rods. It uses a semi-automatic transmission and its state-of-the-art run-flat Goodyear tires will keep going even if you drill big holes in them. It also comes with air conditioning, power windows and door locks, and a 320-watt sound system with a six-disc CD changer and seven speakers.

Just one model is available that retails for $44,625. This lightweight rear-wheel-drive two-seat convertible comes with a 3.5-liter V6 engine and an automatic transmission with AutoStick. It comes well equipped. The only options have to do with the Inca Gold paint.

It is to DaimlerChrysler's credit that real hot rodders generally like and admire the Prowler. They recognize it as the tribute to their cars that it was meant to be. The Prowler is based on a concept car. Few observers at the 1993 North American International Auto Show in Detroit would have believed the stunning concept car turning slowly under the spotlights would eventually see the light of day.

Three years later the car emerged in its eggplant hue with its eggplant-shaped rear hip line, curvaceous and enorm with 20-inch rear wheels, contrasting in delightful incongruity to the airily light front end with motorcycle fenders capping 17-inch wheels and a brash bumper that admits it wouldn't be there on a real hot rod (but looks fine obeying street rules). Originally planned as a halo car for Plymouth, the Prowler is now a Chrysler adoptee.

Image-enhancement is still the car's strong suit, as it enhances the image of the driver. Prowler remains as eye grabbing as ever. Shouts of I love your car trail it through restaurant parking lots. It evokes thumbs up and smiles from every age group, every gender (though most buyers are men).

Operated manually, the top is made of a substantive padded cloth. It fits solidly and looks good when up, and it goes down with relative ease (aided by a few expletives), storing out of sight behind the rear deck lid. The rear window is real glass with defogger. The side windows are power with one-touch down.

The leather-trimmed bucket seats are handsome. They also provide good driving support and cruising comfort. The dash is another Chrysler design statement, a body-colored stretched lozenge-shaped cluster with centralized instruments. Never mind, the important thing is the little round tachometer apparently after-thought-mounted smack in front of the driver's nose on the steering column. It reminds us of hot rods with tachs from the J.C. Whitney's catalog.

Prowler has all sorts of comforts that few real rods have: remote keyless entry, air conditioning, 320-watt stereo with six-CD changer, audio and cruise controls on the steering wheel, power locks, windows and mirrors, even a cupholder (singular).

The Prowler sounds great and is no wimp when it comes to acceleration performance. The first-year Prowler drew some carping for being a mere V6. (Many of the Prowler's components are modified LH bits, including the transaxle transplanted to the rear, nice for balance.) Real rods have V8s, detractors said, but the Prowler power was soon improved.

The current 3.5-liter 24-valve V6 offers 253 horsepower at 6400 rpm (and a well-placed 255 pounds-feet of torque at 3950 rpm). That power has to whup only 2838 pounds off the line.

Sound, which is what noise is called when it's agreeable, is important in the Prowler: the big rear tires on the road surface, the top-down wind whipping by, the rise and fall of the engine's contralto drone sounding like mammoth bees approaching in intimidating numbers. Don't expect the shriek or fabric rip of a V12 or even the rumble of a V8, but the sound this V6 makes is music. You could dance to it.