Right now, Boston indie-metal heroes Isis are headlining a six-week US club tour that will finish up next Sunday, November 3, at the Middle East. The band have just released Oceanic, their first album on Ipecac, the cutting-edge avant-rock label run by former Faith No More frontman Mike Patton. They’re on the road with Ipecac hip-hop stalwarts Dalek, and that’s the first sign that this ain’t your average punk-metal road show. It’s also one reason the tour has been more fulfilling than Isis frontman Aaron Turner expected.

"We did a headlining tour around this time last year," he says over his cell phone as the band make their way from Phoenix to Albuquerque — which is a significant destination for Turner, since he grew up in Santa Fe and his folks will be at the show. "It was okay, but the turnouts weren’t all that great, and some of the venues left something to be desired. This time around, it seems there’s more hype for the band. We’re playing almost all new material, and people are very receptive to it. The diversity of the bill has been really good in terms of pulling good audiences. We’re getting along well with Dalek in a musical sense and a personal sense."

The national rock underground may finally be catching on to Isis in a big way, but local scenesters with an ear for noise have been hip to the band for a while now. Turner formed the group with bassist Jeff Caxide and drummer Aaron Harris in ’97, just as his scene-defining Hydra Head label was starting to take off. (Turner has always made a point of keeping his two main gigs separate: no Isis release has ever come out on Hydra Head.) On their first two EPs, Mosquito Control (Escape Artist) and The Red Sea (Second Nature), the band pushed their way to the metalcore forefront by making a few important refinements to the Hydra Head blueprint. Instead of trying to break the land speed record, they chose to emulate the thunderous plod of Neurosis and the Melvins. And electronics became an integral part of the Isis equation early on.

The current line-up, which is rounded out by guitarist Mike Gallagher and electronics manipulator Cliff Meyer, came together for the 2000 release of their first proper album, Celestial (Escape Artist). Leaving plenty of room for noise and jarring transitions, the disc added a host of new colors to the group’s somber palette. Its companion EP, SGNL>05, was released a year later on the Neurosis-run Neurot imprint and pushed even farther into the outer limits; it culminated in a gorgeous 10-minute remix of "Celestial" by Justin Broadrick of Godflesh. As the band began the process of writing Oceanic, they hooked up with Ipecac through a mutual friend, James Plotkin of Phantomsmasher.

"Celestial was a big step for us, and after that we felt like it was time to take another step," Turner explains. "We needed a label that was gonna be able to support the band a little better in terms of promotion and budgeting. Also, we wanted to find somewhere where we felt like they had an audience that would be receptive to what Isis are doing even if they didn’t have previous knowledge of the band. Ipecac had all those things. They’re very hands-off in terms of the creative side of things, and they put out tons of interesting stuff."

On Oceanic, the band let out a roar that’s as imposing as the album title suggests: songs routinely pass the seven-minute mark, ebbing and flowing between doom-laden guitar outbursts and unsettling electronic interludes. Turner’s anguished scream adds to the outrage, and Harris deftly guides his hypnotic drum patterns in and out of the foreground. Moments of serenity, even beauty, punctuate the tortured din; Isis have always valued melody as much as noise, but playing quietly has never sounded so comfortable to them.

"There’s only so much of the fuckin’ relentless bludgeoning that you can take," Turner concurs. "I think we all just realized that we needed more-dynamic songs to keep us interested in what we’re playing. We just started writing longer quiet parts. I think especially in the live setting, that stuff is just as powerful as the heavier sections. And the heavy sections are complemented by the more placid passages."

The biggest surprise on Oceanic is the band’s inspired collaboration with singer Maria Christopher and guitarist Ayal Naor of local indie-rockers 27. On the disc’s spiraling 10-minute centerpiece, "Weight," Christopher contributes a sweetly meditative vocal hook that ends up exploding into an impassioned yelp. It’s a far cry from Turner’s death-metal growl, but it fits in just fine with the group’s current direction. "That’s been one of the things that’s garnered the biggest reactions — some people hated it at first, but other people were really receptive," says Turner. "We’re a band that likes to do things differently every time we make a record, and we also really enjoy collaborating with people. It was good to have Ayal and Maria go into it with their own ideas and come back with something that really fit the music."

Listening to Isis is like falling into a violently uplifting trance, and the band have always structured their albums with that in mind. Like Black Sabbath or Sonic Youth, they know when to shine a light in the dark. With that old-fashioned album-rock vibe in mind, they separate the disc into two parts halfway through, with an untitled ambient break and the exotic instrumental "Maritime."

"Celestial had its quieter parts, but it was pretty consistently heavy throughout," Turner points out. "With Oceanic, we wanted to create something with a wider emotional range. We were able to hone it down a little better so it wasn’t just distinguished by loud and quiet — it was more like really even transitions between the two. We spent more time fine-tuning all the details, from the sequencing of the tracks to the lyrical content. In terms of trying to create a cohesive whole and still have lots of intricate parts that could stand on their own, this is probably our best achievement."

IN THE LINER NOTES to Lost City Angels’ homonymous debut album (Nitro), there’s a mundane-looking credit that sticks out for all the wrong reasons: "Recorded September 9-14, 2001." "I actually recorded drum tracks on September 11," recalls drummer Adam Shaw. "It sucked, but there was nothing we could do about it. We recorded the album at the Outpost in Stoughton, and we paid for the thing. We couldn’t miss a day, because that’s like a thousand dollars."

Apart from that unpleasant experience, fate has smiled on the Boston punk upstarts, who are currently on a month-long national tour with Flogging Molly and Andrew W.K. that hits the Roxy this Monday. Guitarist Drew Indingaro, bassist Chris Duggan, and Shaw formed the group from the ashes of local punks the Skullys; soon after, they joined forces with frontman Ron Ragona and guitarist Nick Bacon, who had logged time in the defunct ska-punk acts Spring Heeled Jack USA and Pilfers, respectively. The fledgling band hooked up with manager Johnny Rioux, who got former Bosstones guitarist/current Kickovers frontman Nate Albert to produce the disc. All they needed now was a label — so they started stalking Nitro, the SoCal punk imprint owned by Offspring frontman Dexter Holland.

"That’s where we wanted to be — there was no other label," Shaw confirms. "We sent them demos, and when we toured, we’d roll through and say what’s up to them. We became friends with them, and they flew their homeboy out here to see us." But Nitro held out for a while, so the band resorted to the oldest punk bargaining method in the book: blackmail. "We had naked pictures of them and we were like, ‘Listen, you fuckin’ sign us, or we’re sending these ugly displays of humanity to every A&R person we can find.’ And they finally gave in."

Lost City Angels is a catchy, heartfelt album that dresses its sharp hooks in gutterpunk sleaze; it should appeal to fans of high-profile pop-punkers like AFI and Alkaline Trio. Ragona is a tough but sensitive frontman, and Bacon is a hot soloist who sounds as if he’d listened to more AC/DC than Green Day. The bouncy sing-along "First Things First" starts the disc off with a bang; "If You Go" is a weepy waltz that’s as sincere as it is tuneful. "Dreamgirl 89102" is a wistful Sin City vignette that closes the album with an appropriately trashy groove.

"I was in Vegas at a strip club when I was on tour with my old band," explains Ragona when Shaw hands him the phone. "I was fuckin’ wasted and I was sitting there watching a girl. And I was like, ‘You know what, I hate this place.’ I grabbed a matchbook, and the back said Dreamgirls, and the zip code was 89102. I was like, ‘That’s a cool name for a song.’ I thought about that situation and unattainable girls that act like they’re attainable. Then there’s also so many of them that you can’t really decide. It’s a beautiful thing."

Isis perform next Sunday, November 3, at the Middle East, 480 Massachusetts Avenue in Central Square. Call (617) 931-2000. Lost City Angels open for Flogging Molly and Andrew W.K. this Monday, October 28, at the Roxy, 279 Tremont Street. Call (617) 338-7699.