*** Guv'ner

THE HUNT

(Merge)

Singer/guitarist Charles Gansa sounds as if he'd spent some spare afterschool hours studying Television's Marquee Moon. And his steady partner in Guv'ner since '93, bassist Pumpkin Wentzel, is down with that program on The Hunt, the NYC trio's second full-length. It helps that they now have a forceful drummer (Danny Tunick) behind them to assist in navigating the sharp twists and turns built into the tunes, and that they had two NYC-scene vets -- Julia Cafritz (Pussy Galore/Free Kitten) and Don Flemming (Gumball) -- manning the board in the studio.

The result fuses the musical sensibility of early Television -- stark, angular guitar/bass interplay, off-kilter vocals, unwavering beats -- with a kind of playful '90s irony that makes each song come off as an in(die)-joke of sorts. Gansa puts a wry twist on boy-girl politics, answering Carly Simon's "You're So Vain" with the line "I'm so vain, I know this song is about me" ("The Nazarene") against the noisy churn of his guitar. After a few more sardonic pop-culture references turn up in Gansa's vocabulary (Debra Winger mingles with some stoners in "Feet on Wood"), it becomes clear that Guv'ner speak the same cryptic language as Pavement's Steven Malkmus, only with a distinct New York accent.

-- Matt Ashare

(Guv'ner join Cat Power upstairs at the Middle East this Friday, October 25.)