**1/2

VUE

(Sub Pop)

It's hard not to hear the echoes of the Replacements on Vue's Sub Pop debut, because Vue singer/guitarist Rex Shelverton has that same scrubbed-raw vocal tone that was once Paul Westerberg's calling card. And though Shelverton never approaches anything resembling a Westerbergian insight with his lyrics, there's also something about the way Vue's lead guitar rubs dissonantly against the otherwise standard garage-rock riffage that brings to mind the exuberant and sometimes comical mess that was the early, Bob Stinson-era Replacements.

But what Johnny Thunders punk rock was to the 'Mats, goth rock is to San Francisco's Vue -- the grungy goth that came outta suburban garages in the early '80s, not the studio-polished atmospheric goth of today's doom generation. At its best, this predilection finds Vue imbuing murky swamp-blooze guitarisms with a smoky sexiness -- reverb-drenched six-string chordings and low-in-the-mix keyboards, for example, provide a silky casing for workmanlike riffs in "The Shame" and "Cotton Kisses." At their worst . . . well, let's just say that Bauhaus ripoffs aren't half as fun as Nuge ones.

-- Lorne Behrman