SACCHARINE TRUST’S BACK-ALLEY VISIONS

When tenor saxophonist Steven Moss joined Saccharine Trust nine months ago, he had no idea that the band was on the verge of breaking up. “I remember my first day of rehearsal,” he says with a grin. “I didn’t know if I could play with them but I was really happy to be there. And they were arguing! I couldn’t believe it. I had just gotten with these guys and they were going to break up! ‘No! You can’t quit! Wait a while!’ ”

“For a while I was getting tired of it all, this really harsh dissonant stuff,” adds guitarist Joe Baiza, 34. “I didn’t hear that way anymore. I didn’t know if I wanted to keep doing this--start another band or something.”

Fortunately for Moss and the growing numbers of Saccharine Trust fans, the group decided to give it another shot. The band’s third LP, the live “Worldbroken” (on SST Records), began gathering glowing reports from around the country while the addition of Moss provided a new enthusiasm and melodic sound to the music.

Now, with the recent release of its fourth LP, “We Became Snakes,” Saccharine Trust--which plays today at the Music Machine--looks ready for serious contention in the rock marketplace.

This doesn’t mean that the band’s blend of jazz-rock-blues dissonance has been softened in an appeal to the alternative mainstream market. On a good night, Saccharine Trust--Moss, Baiza, vocalist Jack Brewer, bassist Bob Fitzer and drummer Tony Cicero--can still be a disturbing earful for some.

Fans of innovative acts such as the Minutemen, Captain Beefheart, Tom Waits or Sun Ra might have no problem dealing with the jazzy sound, but audiences who come for a night of casual background rock might find it’s more than they bargained for. Despite the name, the effect is often anything but sweet.

“I think the music is a little more difficult (than most bands),” says Moss, 33. “It’s not as accessible, not as many hooks. A lot of people have trouble with the dissonance and the odd time meters.”

Adds Jack Brewer, 27: “I’d call it trying . We’re not the kind of band you can come and see and ignore and just look for the girls. I think we’ve been ignored (in the press) because we’re actually too hard to ignore (in the flesh).”

Until the release of “Worldbroken” last year, there did seem to be a conspiracy of silence about Saccharine Trust. While scores of other local bands rose to national cult status, the 6-year-old Saccharine Trust struggled for an audience.

And it wasn’t due to lack of trying. The group has been on four cross-country tours with label-mates Black Flag, a marriage of convenience that placed the group in the difficult position of trying to play hard music for hard-core fans.

“We have a mutual understanding with hard-core audiences,” says Brewer. “They hate us and we hate ignorance.”

Like fellow South Bay artists the Minutemen, Saccharine Trust began with the idea of developing an individualistic sound and letting the rest of the world catch up. Indeed, the Minutemen, who formed at the same time in an apartment upstairs from Brewer in San Pedro, provided much of the inspiration for the group’s original concept. Former Minutemen bassist Mike Watt played on the “Worldbroken” album and produced “We Became Snakes.”

Says Baiza of the Minutemen: “We’ve always had a completely different direction, but just seeing someone else (be that adventurous) made me feel, well, we’ll do it too. That’s what we advocate--individuality. That’s our message.”

Saccharine Trust’s message is more than individuality.

Brewer’s evocative lyrics are dark and sinewy, chock-full of biblical references, tortured emotions and back-alley visions, like these lines from the new album’s title song:

One night in the garden

Behind a burning bush

We hid from God

We became snakes

Slimy wicked, sliding upon one another

Hissing the secrets of virtue and worship. . . .

“(The songs) are personal,” Brewer says. “How could they not be? If I don’t learn through these experiences maybe someone else will. There’s no preaching or cult or special religion behind it all. It’s just a personal struggle between life and flesh and wondering what more is there. The truth will eventually come to a person who’s restless enough to find it.”

And for Saccharine Trust, an audience restless enough to take a chance is gradually developing.

“I have this dream of (being able) to make your own records with the kind of music you want,” says Moss. “You may not have a big hit but there’s a limited market that’s going to pay your bills. Some parts of the music business are going that way. There are marginal guys like John Prine that aren’t big mass sellers but every time he makes a record he sells 50,000 records--enough to pay the bills. You don’t have to get rich and have cocaine and groupies who give you AIDS and herpes. If you could make the kind of music you want and not have to work at a stupid job, that would be ideal.”

That ideal is almost a reality for Saccharine Trust. And even though things are going better than ever before, Baiza admits that playing without rules musically precludes the creation of any career game plan.

“Saccharine Trust has always been this way--riding a thin line between falling apart and continuing to greater heights,” he says. “It’s hard to do. Each song is a new thing for us. It’s another step to see what happens. Maybe we’ll make it and continue, but who knows?”