"How can I be so skinny and live so fat?" Mike D once asked. Matt Skiba, singer for Chicago's Alkaline Trio might pose a similar question: "How can I sound so happy and be so sad?" Not since Jets to Brazil's debut, Orange Rhyming Dictionary, has an emo record been as gloomy and death-obsessed as the Trio's fourth full-length, Good Mourning. The album's opener, "This Could Be Love," is a pleasant paean to pyromania and incontinence. "I touch myself at thoughts of flames," Skiba croons. "I shat the bed and laid there in it / Thinking of you." Sure, breakup songs are a staple in this genre, but they don't usually involve severed fingers and slit throats. There's a tongue-in-cheek element here – the boys pose in a graveyard in pallbearer's gear on the cover – but it never undercuts the, at times, lugubrious mood. Alkaline Trio are the Misfits of the emo set.

In terms of music, however, Good Mourning is about as dark as, say, blink-182. It's full of limpid pop tunes, with background harmonies and hip-shaking plunka-plunka bass lines. Skiba has jettisoned the growl he exhibited on prior recordings in favor of a supersmooth, lounge-singer delivery. "All in all I guess it's for the better if you just can't feel a fucking thing," he intones on "Donner Party (All Night)." "Fall asleep and die." Well, aren't we a Negative Nancy?

Like Orange Rhyming Dictionary, Good Mourning closes with a nonrocker, "Blue in the Face," an acoustic number that rings somewhat hollow in its attempt to palliate the desperation that precedes it. But with its talk of "disgrace and shameful regret," the band are hardly offering a York Peppermint Patty to wash the taste of the graveyard out of your mouth. "Dream a good one tonight," Skiba recommends on "One Hundred Stories." After a record this dark, that might be tough. Alkaline Trio perform Fri/13 and Sat/14, Slim's, S.F. (415) 255-0333. (Duncan Scott Davidson)

Greens Keepers
The Ziggy Franklen Radio Show (Classic Recordings)

Following a handful of releases that tickled the turntables of the house music world, Chicago's Greens Keepers – James Curd, Nick Maurer, and sometime contributor Mark Share – put out their debut album, The Ziggy Franklen Radio Show, taking great pains to let listeners know they should check their expectations at the door.

Greens Keepers format the record as an eclectic radio show – a trite, if somewhat effective, gimmick borrowed from hip-hop. It's almost an apology for the puzzled look on your face as the first track, the skronking P-Funk-influenced "Upgrades," shifts into the subtle swing of "Fluid," which vaguely evokes War kissing the Steve Miller Band in a high-tech bedroom studio.

Eventually, the album segues into the sound that Greens Keepers are known for: a loose update on '40s swing that embeds elements of Dixieland jazz and swing riffs into a framework of thumping, Chicago-style 4/4 house music. "Dixie Gan" is the best example of this genre mixing, with its fleet-footed blend of speed-banjo picking woven into a chunky boom-clack background guaranteed to make even the staunchest senior citizens kick up their heels. Other tracks play off the same basic theme, adding flamenco touches ("D.C. Minor"), nods to the blues ("Should I Sing Like This?"), and even a bit of country twang ("Low and Sweet").

Greens Keepers' innovative and experimental touch works wonders for their house singles, which stand out in DJ sets. But sandwiched between the lackluster proto-electro of "Mesopotamia," the jazz-fusion-meets-broken-beat slink of "Daughter of the Sun," and the meandering stoner tripno of "Dark Sky," the group's truly signature swing gets lost in the shuffle. (Vivian Host)

Glenn Branca
The Ascension (Acute)

Originally released on 99 Records in 1981, The Ascension marks a transition for Glenn Branca from his rock bands, the Static and Theoretical Girls, to the guitar symphonies he is best known for. Ascension can also be seen as the point at which the early-'80s New York underground merged with high-art ambition, exemplified by the Sonic Youth crew who served in Branca's guitar army.

You can hear it in a track like "Spectacular Commodity," which shifts from dark, ominous clangings into triumphant melodies pulled out of four open-tuned electric guitars. The simple rhythm section of Stephen Wischerth and Jeffrey Glenn allows Branca's, Lee Ranaldo's, Ned Sublette's, and David Rosenbloom's guitars to collide and respond melodically. Even in his vocal groups, Branca's songs were always repetitive and minimal, quite different from the raging skronk and skree that is associated with no wave. Though this record has its jarring, visceral moments, the harmonics and drones of "Light Field (In Consonance)" hint at the likes of Godspeed You! Black Emperor rather than the retro Gang of Four set.

Just like Robert Longo's famous fighting suits that adorn the cover, the record is about the savagery lurking under polite surfaces. As an embodiment of that tension between control and chaos, Ascension still sounds vital. (George Chen)

Apes
Oddeyesee (Frenchkiss)

Unburdened by guitars, unbridled by inhibition, and heavy as hell, Washington, D.C.'s Apes could very well rule the psych-rock jungle. Manic vocalist Paul Weil is as liable to go snout-to-snout with you, dear audience member, wrap his mic chord around your neck, and shake his pretty, nonprimate-scented hair in your face, as he is to climb and pose on a kick drum, or pivot and pirouette like an acid-washed, metal James Brown in toe shoes. Drummer Jeff Schmid and bassist Erick Jackson drive the action, show their bottoms, and bound through the Apes' psych-goth songbook with bared teeth. The cloaked and bug-eyed Amanda Kleinman generates much of the menace on organ, alternating between power chords, baroque runs, and weird fillips. See them live, feel the fugue, and it's clear these Apes could be monsters.