*** The Smugglers

ROSIE

(Lookout!)

Perhaps garage is to be the last of the retro rocks to be turned over. Certainly if recent ska and swing revivals -- both of dubious vitality -- can climb the charts, there oughtta be room for bands who write short, hard pop songs and knew all the music on Nuggets before the most recent box set came out. The Smugglers, a quintet from Vancouver, have been banging around for 10 years; they're big in Spain. They have become a crisp, polished live act that's glorious fun, and it all transfers nicely to their newest long-player, Rosie.

Lots of bands work these grooves in the comparative obscurity of a mostly West Coast (and Japanese) underground that worships vinyl, old American cars, and classic girlie magazines. And booze. At its heart, today's garage rock is a middle-class re-enactment of music made in working-class bars before the Beatles made rock and roll an art form. This ain't art, but it's artful. Since the Smugglers are more lovers than fighters, even their macho guitar lines and party-on anthems are undercut by well-tuned vocals and loser-friendly lyrics: fast, punchy songs whose initial aggression is leavened by craft and cleverness. Y'know, rock and roll.

-- Grant Alden