Halfway through listening to L.A.-based Gwenmars's Driving a Million, you will have a headache. The band is often loud and crunchy, but the brain pain will actually result from the 100 times you'll smack yourself in the forehead wondering what song from alt-rock's late '80s, early-'90s heyday each track sounds exactly like. Sweetly howled Kurt Cobain-ish choruses ("Neon Tom," "Venus," "Train Song"), the fetchingly strumming romance of Echo and the Bunnymen ("She Hung the Moon"), the reverb-soaked shoegazing of a million bands that have since imploded ("Radio Gun")--the list goes on and on, but, thankfully, this is a case of imitation being the sincerest form of flattery. Driving a Million is the sexy, funky homage to the golden age of college rock that bands like Stone Temple Pilots promised, but never quite delivered. --Bob Michaels

Los Angeles trio Gwenmars latest effort is packed with solid songs filled with a sense of the frigid, synth modernism of post-punk and the apocalyptic glee of glam rock. A sound that evokes a world where Gary Numan's icy hooks pierce the gut-wrenching energy of Nirvana. Standard jewel case. 2001 release.