There’s Really Nothing Mystical About Underworld’s Success : Pop Beat: The London-based dance trio mixes illusive elements with the organic presence of guitar, bass, drums and real-live vocals.

There’s a sort of twisted mysticism that surrounds techno music and the artists who hone the style.

In many ways, it’s a hipper take on New Age in which crystals are replaced by hallucinogens, ethnic caftans by synthetic baggywear and harmonic convergence by a spellbinding beat.

The dance floor is the shrine, where the enigmatic creators behind the bass-heavy thunder, such as Messiah and Lords of Acid, seem as vaporous and untouchable as the image of the Great and Powerful Oz.

“Techno is for people wanting to dance, but as far as finding some deep and meaningful thing in there . . . ,” says Karl Hyde of London’s newest club revelation, Underworld. “It’s just music that gives a damn about whether you’re having a good time or not.”

The London-based dance trio does combine enough illusive elements to mesmerize--a neato name, surreal musical effects and a repetitive beat. But it cuts the mysticism with the organic presence of guitar, bass, drums and real-live vocals.

Its fifth album, “Dubnobasswithmyheadman,” not only proves that the dance floor is ready for the presence of mere mortals, but also that the alternative-rock world is opening to techno as well. While the album’s first single, “Cowgirl,” hit the Top 20 of Billboard’s dance charts this summer, its most recent single, “Dirty Epic,” is infiltrating college radio, as well as such larger alternative stations as L.A.’s KROQ.

The rock world is not new territory for Underworld, though. It started as a rock band with funk trimmings in 1988, but soon developed a more club-oriented sound.

“It was the raves of the late ‘80s that inspired us,” says Hyde, who co-founded the trio with Rick Smith and later inducted well-known deejay Darren Emerson.

“It was like what concerts used to be--exciting,” Hyde said. “You got value for your money, and it went on forever. It was a spectacle. You didn’t have to deal with watching someone else get off on their own ego. We got tired of that, and said, ‘Let’s just make good music and have a good time, because I don’t think the heroes are offering us a whole lot anymore.’ ”

Smith and Hyde started out in the band Freur in the early ‘80s, best known for the quirky new-wave hit “Doot--Doot” (which KROQ still plays). After disbanding following the 1985 album “Get Us Out of Here,” four of the five members reunited as Underworld, which went on to release two albums with Sire.

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Frustrated with its musical direction, Hyde and Smith parted with the major label, picked up Emerson and went on to release two independent albums, which soon became favorites of deejays throughout Europe’s dance scene. They signed with the industrial-dance label WaxTrax in the States earlier this year.

The Underworld members expected it to take a while for their techno mutation to catch on and were unprepared for the recently warm reception from both the mainstream and more cutting-edge dance world.

“We brought in elements from way outside the music of our contemporaries,” Hyde says. “One of the initial challenges was being a singing guitar player in a genre that really hated that. (In techno) there was no space for vocals, and especially lyrics, so it was a surprise when we were accepted by the dance fraternity.”

Hyde’s main inspiration comes from neither a rock nor dance icon though.

“Miles Davis is my hero,” Hyde says. “It’s the way he was never afraid to reinvent himself when he knew it was time to move on. He might alienate his most loyal fans, but you have to keep moving--pulling yourself to pieces, rearranging, moving on.”

Potent Portis: While Underworld creeps slowly into America’s college-rock psyche, Britain’s Portishead isn’t far behind. The band may not be a household name yet, but the surreal-sounding outfit’s debut album, “Dummy,” was recently voted best album in a year-end critics’ poll by London’s weekly music paper Melody Maker.

Since hyperbole is as common in the paper as pouty-lip bands are in England, it’s amazing that the chosen band actually deserves it.

Portishead, a duo of Beth Gibbons and Geoff Barrows that came from the same Bristol scene as Massive Attack, has truly delivered one of the year’s most unique albums. The London Records release offers Gibbons’ moody and bleeding vocals over hazy Eastern European melodies that are squeezed between sad, minimal guitar, eerie electronic effects and dozens of subtle samples.

While the machine-enhanced tunes of both Underworld and Portishead aren’t exactly going to steal the spotlight from Pearl Jam and its guitar-heavy peers, both bands provide a true alternative to so-called alternative rock.