NTX & The Electric Sexxx

If you get out the sandpaper and start working away at the Electric Sexxx's sound, if you rub away some of the distortion from the vocals, a little of the fuzz from the guitars, if you get the random dogs to bark in tune, if you ice some of the squalling feedback and get rid of the harpsichords and whatever else, you'll find there's actually melody and cohesion down there in the squalid depths of their sound. Real songs lurk under all the racket. Singer Nikki Texas, keyboardist Erika Thrasher, guitarist Brandon Davis, saxperson Candice Vincent and very special guest guitarist Domokos have it in 'em to be big stars in this business, but you know they don't really care. Their new album, We Are the Wild Beast, kinda reminds you of that kid in high school who got a 1570 on the PSAT as a sophomore and then got kicked out of school for cooking up LSD in the chemistry lab -- he wasn't an underachiever, exactly, just a high achiever of a different, less socially acceptable sort. Anthemic album opener "Walk Through Fire" sounds like Longwave chopped and screwed, or Shabooh Shoobah-era INXS filtered through the ears of someone overdosing on Special K. "Poison the Choir" is another great song wrapped in swamp sludge. Oh, well, there's lots of noise rock bands that are ugly for ugly's sake, but most of them probably can't do any better. This is a band that won't, for reasons of their own, and there's a big difference.