There is a distinctive smell in the air at the Peacock Lounge. I can't say for sure that it's a consistent feature of the place, never having been there before tonight. Perhaps it's just settling dust from the construction that recently rectified the lack of a fire exit. Or it could be must from the disuse of the past year or two. More likely, though, it's the pungent sweat of a throng of midweek revelers pogoing their evening away. "Hump Day" never sounded so dead on.

Add to this human humidity something perfumy and floral, maybe a whiff of vitamins. It's probably not coming from lead Coachwhip John Dwyer, a regular name-droplet of the San Francisco freak rock insurgence. He's best known for his stint in Landed and as a pink bodysuit champion in Pink and Brown, but Coachwhips is Dwyer's sixth or seventh band since he moved here. Who can keep count? Dwyer has said that Coachwhips are the band that will get the most pussy. I hate to say he's right, but their garage primitivism gets groins churning better than Pink and Brown's tardcore or Dig That Body Up's machismo. Of course, Coachwhips' idea of sensitivity is a lyric like "Look into my eyes when you come."

Compared with the rest of the one-man industry of Dwyer rock, Coachwhips have some much-needed gender balance in keyboardist and maraca shaker Mary Ann McNamara. The keyboards were finally audible at the Peacock and added texture to the one-two, one-two gallop of John Harlow on drums. Having a woman onstage seems to have expanded the axes of libidinal projection and audience identification.

Maybe that explains the mingling of a nice organic odor with the familiar beer-crust stench of S.F. boy bands. The smell of this show, if it had one, might be saffron – if I knew what that smelled like. Same way I don't know for sure what bands Coachwhips are ripping off, though I am tempted to cite Billy Childish or the whole Radio X garage rock crew. Songs like "Hands on the Controls," from their Black Apple album Hands on the Control, get the party started, Dwyer straining through an old-fashioned microphone, the type young Elvis uses on his postage stamp. It's a neat way to play time traveler, but thankfully, they aren't doing garage rock as a mere retro-homage. They're scavengers of abandoned technologies, playing tiny Casios and a battered floor tom. Though Coachwhips avoid the political ideology of a band like the Quails, their party line speaks to the lifestyle libertarians that have always found a home in San Francisco.