The Hives
"Veni Vidi Vicious"
(Sire/Burning Heart/Epitaph)

"Got out way late in 2008," singer "Howlin'" Pellee Almqvist sings on "The Hives  Declare Guerre Nucleaire," the opening track on "Veni Vidi Vicious." "Let's do it all again in 2010!"

Do it again: There's absolutely nothing on this disc that wouldn't have sounded familiar (if not retreaded) in 1966, much less '76, '86 or '96. And so what?

Originality is overrated in rock. The late critic Lester Bangs, champeen of all things garage, famously drew a line from "La Bamba" by Ritchie Valens through "Louie Louie" by the Kingsmen, "You Really Got Me" by the Kinks, "No Fun" by the Stooges, up to the then-current "Blitzkrieg Bop" by the Ramones. "There: twenty years of rock 'n' roll history in three chords, played more primitively each time they are recycled," he wrote. But those dependable fuzz tones never get tired, so long as they're accompanied by a propulsive backbeat, maximum adrenaline and a modicum of melody, and Sweden's Hives have all of that.

The Hives arrive on American shores with a fair amount of hype (no less an arbiter of hip than Courtney Love has declared them "better than the Strokes") and an awful lot of shtick (the matching playboy suits; the names -- the other members have pseudonyms like Nicholaus Arson and Vigilante Carlstroem -- and the silly conceit that instead of Arson writing all the material, it's contributed by a mysterious, never-seen sixth party named Randy Fitzsimmons). Don't let any of that distract you from the fact that this disc (which has been out in Europe for some time, but is only now being picked up for broader distribution here) burns like Ben Gay applied to a sensitive spot for which it was never intended.

"Punk-rock music avec kaboom!" the boys cheekily call it, carefully avoiding the "New Garage" tag being applied to the likes of Detroit's White Stripes, New York's Mooney Suzuki and Seattle's Catheters. But garage is what it is, a direct descendant of Lenny Kaye's "Nuggets" compilation of '60s one-hit wonders, marginally talented meatheads who took to their basements with Sears Silvertone guitars, slavishly imitated the Beatles and had a fleeting brush with fame before moving on to careers as district managers for Thom McAnn Shoes. But there's a key difference from '80s garage revivalists like the Fuzztones, the Fleshtones and the Chesterfield Kings: The Hives aren't so super-serious about it all.

Yes, these Swedes know and appreciate rock's past. But they don't wish it was 1966 again -- they're happy to be living in the present, thank you very much -- and their sonic mix boasts as much Nirvana (who also borrowed the same three chords) as Electric Prunes, Amboy Dukes and Thirteenth Floor Elevators. All of which may be unduly straining to justify the fact that tunes like "A Get Together to Tear It Apart," "Main Offender" and "Supply and Demand" are potent enough to prompt any lover of this stuff to jump around like a gleeful idiot. And I dare you to try to refrain from indulging.

-- Jim DeRogatis

Paul Westerberg
"Stereo/Mono"
(Vagrant Records)

When the Replacements started their decade-long run in the '80s, they quickly moved from sloppy garage punk to slightly more refined pre-indie rock. As the band gained with the burgeoning college radio crowd, their volatile music reflected in the act's live performances. That made going to a Replacements' show a gamble: They were drunks, which could mean that you'd get a slobberingly great show, or a sloberingly bad show that the band could barely finish. Rebellious until the end, the band finally imploded in the early '90s, way before they burned through their ability to make good music.

Replacements frontman Paul Westerberg's fourth post-break solo album, "Stereo/Mono," relives the untamed, emotional delivery that made the Replacements so great -- minus the surrounding drama. The liner notes to Mono (Part 2 of the two-disc set) admit, "This is rock 'n' roll recorded poorly, played in a hurry, with sweaty hands and unsure reason ... It feels right. This is in my blood." Stereo, on the other hand, is a collection of work that spans a two-year period of writing and recording at Westerberg's home. It was "cut mostly live in the middle of the night, no effort was made to fix what some may deem as mistakes; tape running out, fluffed lyrics, flat notes, extraneous noises, etc. Many were written (or born if you will) as the tape rolled. Unprofessional? Perhaps. Real? Unquestionably."

The results are two CDs that brim with primitive optimism, as the music shuffles between naked, moody pop (Stereo) to gritty indie rock (Mono) -- like the Replacements, but with half the noise on hold. The mistakes are obvious -- songs grinding to a halt, Westerberg's voice straining a little too hard -- but overall, the rough patches only add to the discs' charm.

-- Jennifer Maerz

Recent Stories