A Consumer’s Guide to Sub Pop’s Best

Long hair . . . riffs copped from Led Zeppelin and the Stooges . . . greasy, fuzzed-out guitar solos that seem mailed in from Mars . . . unintelligible, bellowed lyrics. So far, most of the groups from the Sub Pop grunge factory share certain similarities. Then again, so did groups from the Motown stable. A consumer’s guide to Sub Pop’s best:

NIRVANA--This power trio from rural Washington state might be the best rock ‘n’ roll band you’ve never heard of, its debut LP “Bleach,” the hardest-rocking record you don’t own. Deep-deep metal riffs repeated as relentlessly as beats on a hip-hop record, washes of guitar white noise, singer Kurdt Kobain bellowing punk koans above the din: “I’m a negative creep, I’m a negative creep, I’m a negative creep. . . .” Nirvana is master of the sort of anarchic hard-rock fullness you might associate with Jimi Hendrix.

THE FLUID--From Denver, the Fluid sound a little like the other Sub Popistas--full and loud and strong, just sloppy enough to escape plastic studio-guy perfection, overlaid with a dram of fuzzed-out Blue Cheer guitar. Yet the hardcore-tinged take on classic late-’60s garage-rock on their “Roadmouth” LP can be a bit closer to homage than it is to appreciation. In other words, they sometimes sound like the Stooges, not just like they listen to the Stooges. Plus, they crank.

MUDHONEY--They let their guitars feed back as much as they want. They play metal riffs as loud as they want--intricate multi-part metal riffs that slither about, revealing new facets of themselves. They’re ferocious, sloppy and sincere. Small numbers of people think their EP “Superfuzz Bigmuff” and their self-titled LP are close to the godhead, and appreciation of the Seattle quartet is a sign of cultural literacy to scruffy humanities students on campuses across the nation. By the time the members of Mudhoney master their instruments, the band’s career will have ended, but for now they’re just awesome--especially live.

TAD--Tad is loud, Tad is dissonant, Tad is fronted by a 300-pound ex-butcher from Boise named Tad. Tad never gets a good mix on stage. Seattle-based Tad is Sub Pop’s “art” band, which means that they’re like other Sub Pop bands, only with stranger vocals. If you took a primal scream, amplified it greatly, and recorded it over an MC5 record in a blast furnace, you might approximate the weepy rage of Tad’s LP “God’s Balls,” though not the charm of its “hit,” “Sex God Missy,” which is among the catchiest pop songs the label has yet released.

THE WALKABOUTS--Known for neither hair-flipping nor aggressive, testosterone-fueled Angst , Seattle’s Walkabouts--fronted by a woman! --are sort of the one Sub Pop band that doesn’t sound like a Sub Pop band. They play quiet, feedback-flavored pop, a little like a folkier Cowboy Junkies.