Girls Against Boys: Freak*on*ica

Washington, D.C.'s Girls Against Boys' power-drill approach to rock and roll lands them somewhere between Jesus Lizard, Public Image Ltd., and the Psychedelic Furs—a trio of bands who also saw merit in viscerally excavating same-key grooves with the gnashing gusto of a dentist drilling a deep cavity. On their three previous albums, including 1993's apocalyptic Venus Luxure No. 1 Baby, GVSB perfected a kind of simmering, metallic meltdown—part electronic, part dizzy guitar drone, and part sultry, low-register sex rock. Singer Scott McCloud's raspy growl fits hand-in-glove with that droning groove, while Eli Janney's keyboards and McCloud's guitar pummel mind-numbing riffs 'til you can't hear 'em no more.

Some say the highly anticipated Freak*on*ica, the band's fourth album and first for a major label, will help to redefine heavy, guitar-based rock for the millennium. Realistically, though, the conclusion ends up being less revelatory. Impressively postindustrial, Freak*on*ica winds up being more admirable than exhilarating, more sudden than enduring. Songs like the depraved, lurching "Park Avenue"; the grating, Sonic Youth-inspired "Exile"; and the percussive, Steve Albini-esque "Cowboy's Orbit" sound desperately exciting, with great rhythmic momentum and memorable vocal hooks. But too much of the album dwells in the same dark, blank spaces, with few hooks and fewer melody lines to grasp. Not that the album doesn't deserve your attention. It's just a little less momentous, and a little more "real" than advertised. Bob Gulla