Pink Spiders

Like Cheap Trick with less gloss and more edge — or Elvis Costello had he been a fan of raging keggers — the Pink Spiders blast onstage full-throttle. At a November show held in a Saint Louis University gym, the Nashville-based group made the best of the venue's echoing acoustics and debuted catchy, ragged songs from their upcoming major-label debut, Teenage Graffiti (which was produced by Cars svengali Ric Ocasek). Formed less than three years ago, the Pink Spiders self-released an EP in early 2004 and sold nearly 4,000 copies of it while road-tripping with bands such as the Letters Organize. The impressive CD sales attracted interest from CI Records, who released the band's full-length debut, Hot Pink, last year. Unsurprisingly, that disc conjures the era when rockers came saddled with their own larger-than-life mythologies. Take the swaggering attitude of the Stones, the primitive swing of early Beatles, the devil-may-care hooks of snotty punks and charismatic personalities — including Bob Ferrari, who christens himself "World's Greatest Drummer" on his MySpace profile — and these Spiders weave a web of venomous rock & roll.