*** Construction Joe

CONSTRUCTION JOE

(Sonic Dirt Music)

This Burlington (Vermont) rock trio's mix of anger and irony survives on flippant lyrics backed by not-so-flippant bottlenecked or bent strings, distortion-fraught chords, or peculiar arrangements of percussion and banjo. The nervy rhythm-rocker "Misanthrope," with its lyric "When I get home, I want to drink my beer" and bitter, writhing guitars, claims the pain of blue-collar blues by musical illustration. The instrumentals "Elliot" and "Milkhouse," the latter a banjo-led romp, construct with rough-edged, minor trills a kind of backlash against pop complacency. Singer/guitarist David Kamm pushes the banjo's instrumental boundaries with unvirtuosic plucking fury. The band's simpler arrangements, like those of sometime banjo pluckers and hometown fellows Phish, offset ecstatic single-string guitar rhythms with honest lyrics -- particularly on the airy, gleeful "Spider," where Kamm bleats helplessly, "I am chilled by your bleeding indifference."

-- Marc Levy