BUZZ BANDS

A comfy connection

The spawn of Fugazi still proliferate on the indie rock landscape, but if you subtract the whiners, there are precious few bands as arty and literate as their forebears. Maybe that’s how the Valley Arena caught the ear of Thursday frontman Geoff Rickley, who signed the Long Beach quartet to his Astro Magnetics imprint.

“We had the record done and we had no idea how we were going to put it out,” singer-guitarist Chris Stevens says of the foursome’s debut, “Take Comfort in Strangers,” which comes out April 26. “Geoff got ahold of it later and met us. We liked where he was coming from.”

The album was produced by engineer Jason Cupp, who hooked up with the band through a mutual friend in the L.A. band the Kite Eating Tree. While “Take Comfort’s” jabbing guitar riffs and measured vocals rarely careen into histrionics, the Valley Arena’s live show can be over the top.

Stevens and bandmates Warren Woodward, Dave South and Mike Nielson play tonight at the Knitting Factory, with some summer dates ahead on the Warped Tour. “We’ve toured hard in small clubs, so it’s pretty exciting to play an outdoor festival,” Stevens says. “We’ll see how the kids respond.”

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Prix having grand time

When they began the friendship that would evolve into the rock quartet the Prix (pronounced “pree”), Blake Jordan and Cashew found they had plenty in common -- including an affinity for ‘60s pop prodigy Emitt Rhodes. That they ended up working with one of their heroes is testimony to the adage: It never hurts to ask.

“Recording with him was a blessing.... Just the way we found him was a surprise,” says Cashew, 28. “He was in the phone book.”

The Prix, who join the Rolling Blackouts and the Willowz on a bill tonight at the Viper Room, have recorded four tracks in Rhodes’ garage studio in Hawthorne. Two songs that the band is circulating as a single, “Baby Babylonia” and “Wind to Blow,” display the lovingly tousled pop that could have crackled out of transistor radios during the Johnson administration. “With nice, clean production, it could have come out sounding like Jellyfish,” Cashew says, “but that’s not what we were going for.”

The Prix, which includes Zach Ziegler and Stephen Mills, aims to have an album completed by summer.

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No more loafing

There’s more dignity than shame in “Dignity and Shame,” the latest release from Crooked Fingers, the 5-year-old project of ex-Archers of Loaf frontman Eric Bachmann. Songwriter Bachmann plumbs the depths arrestingly, his band flavoring his melancholy rumin-

ations with orchestral flourishes and the occasional twang.

“This record was fun for me to make because it was more collaborative,” says Bachmann, crediting bandmates Barton Carroll and Dov Friedman with contributing to the arrangements of the band’s fourth release. “It’s really liberating for me to finish [writing] the songs with just a general idea of where they’re going and everybody else does their thing. It makes you less self-absorbed about it.”

Crooked Fingers has forged its own identity, distancing Bachmann from the rackety but respected indie rock of his previous band. “It’s unrealistic to think that people aren’t going to change,” he says of his new artistic direction. “If I was to sound like Archers of Loaf today, it would be the most insincere music ever.”

Crooked Fingers performs Friday at the Knitting Factory.

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Fast Forward

Nothing like some weekend shopping -- Dublab is hosting the Los Angeles Independents Records Fair from 2 to 7 p.m. Sunday at the Little Temple. While DJs spin in the lounge, the rest of the venue will be packed with vendors from some 35 local indie labels, hawking albums and merch.... Next week’s edition of Amoeba Music’s Home Grown Showcase sounds enticing. The show, which goes off at 8 p.m. Tuesday at the Mint, not only features singer-songwriters Shawn Amos (whose latest album “Thank You Shirl-ee May” is a homage to his mother) and Jake La Botz, as well as Soda and His Million Piece Band, but the advertised “special guest” truly is special.... Not all of Alternative Press magazine’s next-big-

thing bands sound and look alike. Really. The catches of the AP Tour, which stops Tuesday and Wednesday at the Roxy and next Thursday at the House of Blues Anaheim, are the tuneful Brooklyn quintet the Honorary Title and Gratitude, the project launched last year by Jonah Matranga of Onelinedrawing.... Speaking of the Roxy, Austin’s favorite son Bob Schneider comes back for shows Friday and Saturday.... Augustana warms up for a May tour with the Stereophonics by playing tonight at Tangier, Wednesday at King King and next Thursday at the Silverlake Lounge.... Yummy: At the release party for Russian-born songstress Marina V’s “Simple Magic” on Saturday at the Hotel Cafe, they’ll be serving Russian chocolate.

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Kevin Bronson