Also this issue:

OK, Here's The Situation
Prodigal rocker Christopher Tucker is back with a brand-new invention.
-A.D. Amorosi

CD Reviews
-Nicole Pensiero, Mary Armstrong and A.D. Amorosi

Sage Francis
-Elisa Ludwig

Gang Starr
-Paul Burress

Wu Man
-Peter Burwasser

Carissa's Wierd
-Patrick Rapa

The Gig
-Nate Chinen on Jazz

Vienna Philharmonic
-Peter Burwasser

February 27-March 5, 2003

musicpicks

The Raveonettes

With the fractured faerie tale of Factory Records, 24 Hour Party People, stuck in my DVD player and Interpol's glaringly melodramatic Psychedelic Furs-meet-Joy Division Turn On the Bright Lights stuck in my head, it"s perhaps time to relive my post-Mancunian days in full despite the looming gloom of "NYC" still flashing like a slow strobe. Moving in slippery, incremental steps, the next move could be the Cramps-meet-Jesus & Mary Chain savagery of The Raveonettes. The Danish duo's Whip It On (The Orchard) is creepier, sexier and harder than anything nu-garage can offer -- a frantic, sugary spider web of mordant melody careening loud and loose against trashcan rhythms and dead-man's-curvy surf guitars. Producer Richard Gottehrer (Blondie, Richard Hell) pumps up the girl-boy voices as loudly as he does the drums, especially when Sharin Foo coos in adulteress harmonies like "Veronica Fever" against Sune Rose Wagner's thunderously gray monotones. It's a kick that'll drive your dark, latter-'70s infatuation into 2004.

Tue., March 4, 8 p.m., $14, with Interpol, The Trocadero, 1003 Arch St., 215-922-LIVE.

—A.D. Amorosi