Also this issue: Underdog Night DJ Cosmo Baker's hip-hop Remedy night turns 5. -Sean O’Neal Indie Blastoff -Ainé Ardron-Doley Beat Box Very Emergency Facing illness and boredom, The Promise Ring changes its pace. -Chris Parker Billy Bob Thornton -A.D. Amorosi

May 23-29, 2002

musicpicks

French Kicks

After lulling us into submission with the Brian Wilson bricolage-pop of Brendan Benson, Brooklyn's StarTime label revs up with its psychedelic surround-sounding French Kicks debut CD One Time Bells. Following up the lurching, raw rhythms (think Television-meets-the Dolls when David Johansen sung the blues) of their six-tune EP Young Lawyers, the Kicks expand their elongated guitar twin tones (still cracklin' like ham radio waves) into some slippery surf-pop. Hinting at the band's hardcore start in D.C., the disc never fails to freak out in ways that'd knock the Stripes off the Whites. The messiest of Bells' gong-banging blasts, "Close To Modern" and "1985," feature Josh Wise's and Matthew Stinchcomb's intertwining shrieks. But where messianic singers are concerned, you'll dig drummer/vocalist Nick Stumpf the most. Not since Keith Moon's drunken solo LP has a powerhouse drummer maintained percussive frenzy whilst singing and sneering in his Sunday-best Joe Jackson voice.

Fri., May 24, 9:30 p.m., $8, with Lefty’s Deceiver, Ken and This Radiant Boy, The Khyber, 56 S. Second St., 215-238-5888.

—A.D. Amorosi