On the side

Bachmann, it turns out, is himself a renaissance man of sorts, who goes by the name of Barry Black on an eclectic new homonymous Alias release. He's not alone in taking advantage of the creative freedom his position allows. Weezer bassist Matt Sharp goes out and proves he's a master of the Moog with the Rentals on Return of the Rentals (Maverick). And on the homonymous Touch & Go debut New Wet Kojak, two members of NYC's edgy and seductive Girls Against Boys indulge their rather sophisticated improvisational skills. These aren't solo discs in the traditional sense. Neither are they necessarily "side projects," as the Rentals and New Wet Kojak take pains to point out in their bios. They're alternate outlets for a handful of ambitious artists who are anything but daunted by the prospect of making the underground a bit more crowded.

The Barry Black disc is the most surprising of the three, the one most likely to trigger an I-didn't-think-he-could-do-that double-take. Bachmann handles most of the instrumentation on Barry Black, which includes sax, Moog synth, drums, and banjo. Ben Folds and an assortment of other Chapel Hill-based indie-rockers pitch in, but Barry Black is the Eric Bachmann show. Most of the disc's tracks are clever instrumentals with Bachmann's distinctive voice -- a hound dog barking with big meaty chunks of melody caught in its teeth -- relegated to a supporting role. There's the laid-back guitar twang of "Mighty Fields of Tobacco," the fiddle-driven stomp of "The Broad Majestic Haw," and the goofy chaos of "Train of Pain."

"Fisherman Thugs" sounds like a demented inversion of something from Fiddler on the Roof with its hoarse "ra-ta-ta-ta-ta-dat" vocals. And damn if the fiddle and clarinet on "Animals Are for Eating" don't conjure up a klezmer motif that I've heard at Jewish weddings. Half the fun of Barry Black is discovering Bachmann's musical depth. The other half is finding that he turns what might have been an exercise in chops into something that's fun for us, too.

New Wet Kojak offer a different kind of fun, with a sexier, more sinister undercurrent and loungy-jazz overtones. The brainchild of Girls Against Boys regulars Scott McCloud and Johnny Temple, who jointly handle most of the instrumentation, the disc sounds like the result of a couple of late-night whiskey jags in the studio, where everyone's loose but not quite hammered. McCloud's nicotine- scarred voice is a constant reminder that we're in familiar territory, but Girls Against Boys' storms of abrasive melody and angular grooves are replaced by a more forgiving atmosphere. Avant-squawks give way to a warm, resonant sax riff on "Freak Now"; sci-fi surf guitar and echoing cries of "woo" glide across an understated funk bass on "Sexy Postcard." McCloud peppers the exotic soundscapes with intriguing bits of verse about pots calling kettles black and whatnot, but it's his command of mood that makes New Wet Kojak so appealing.

Return of the Rentals isn't much of a surprise. Like the radio hit "Friends of P.," the rest of the album doesn't stray too far from the hummable bubblegrunge of Matt Sharp's other band, Weezer. But Sharp, who's joined on the disc by singer Cherielynn Westrich, Weezer drummer Pat Wilson, That Dog violinist Petra Haden, and guitarist Rod Cervera, uses the band to indulge his love of Moog synths, which provide a good half of the hooks on the disc. Think of Weezer's can-of-cheese guitar spread and Ritz-cracker melodies topped off with a colorful assortment of synth lines and chirpy background vocals. The result sounds even more like the Cars than Weezer's Ric Ocasek-produced homonymous DGC debut. But mainly the Rentals offer a quirky twist on Weezer's unabashedly catchy smirk pop. For anybody from the DGC A&R department who was out looking for the next "Sweater Song" while Maverick signed the Rentals, a little lesson: the next Weezer was right under their noses.