*** THE KATIES

(Sponge-bath/Elektra)

Melodic power pop is hardly the rarest commodity, and the Katies, from Murfreesboro, Tennessee, are hardly its most distinctive interpreters. But whereas punk pop's upstarts usually insist on streamlining their radio ditties, the Katies have a cultivated sense of dinosaur-rock gesture: Zeppy unison riffs, Beatlesque major-to-minor chord changes, and dramatic Nazareth-style melodies, with plenty of sloppy edges, rambling drum fills, and dynamic shifts. And under the big-rock exterior there's a dressed-down, grunged-up Jellyfish, or a rural Wondermints, shades of the Plimsouls, Dwight Twilley, Bram Tchaikovsky, the Buzzcocks, and Blondie. Sure, they sound conspicuously like Cheap Trick on the hooky single "Noggin' Poundin'," where singer Jason juggles the spirits of Zander and Lennon. But how do you square the Sonic Youthisms of "Tappin' Out" and the Third Eye Blind vibe of "Drowner"? What's up with the Mudhoney riff on "Miss Melodrama"? I doubt the Katies -- whose Tennessee stomping ground is the buzz scene in power-pop circles lately -- consider the encyclopedic implications of their panoramic pop-pourri; they're much too busy rocking, and you can't do that by the book.

-- James Rotondi