By Peter Nicholson

NEVER MIND WHAT Flavor Flav said – when we're talking about SA-RA, go on and believe the hype.

It's hard to recall another group that's generated so much discussion before they've even released a record. Fueled by feverish trading of their CD-Rs, a few live shows, plus remixes and production for the likes of N.E.R.D., Jurassic 5, and Pharoahe Monch, the trio of Om'Mas Keith, Taz Arnold, and Shafiq Husayn are stepping into the spotlight. Rumors of a NAACP Image Award nomination are swirling, and they're in "serious negotiations" with Kanye West regarding signing to his label – it's all a bit crazy for a group that'll only release their first official singles ("Glorious" on ABB Soul and "Coco Pop"/"Death of a Star" on Ubiquity) at the end of this month. A Ubiquity album is due in February.

Articulate and confident, Keith certainly has the ego to match the buzz; but most important, the trio have the beats to back it all up. Over the speakerphone as he drives in New York (all three members are bicoastal, though they recently established the SA-RA Compound in Los Angeles's Silver Lake neighborhood as their base of operations), Keith explains that all members work on each song before it's considered completed. "Our approach to making music is pretty much free-for-all, everybody come with your ideas, and then we just work from there. We're all writers, we all are very skilled as lyricists, and we're players, and we're singers, and we're rappers – the whole gamut."

The results range from strutting yet stately R&B with an outer-space sheen, to thick hip-hop that pairs a ragged bass synth with spaghetti-western guitars, to numbers that contrast almost baroque vocal arrangements with playfully obscene lyrics. Andrew Jervis, cohost of KUSF, 90.3 FM's Friday Night Session and head of A&R for Ubiquity, recalled via e-mail the first time he heard a SA-RA track, when it was played by another Ubiquity artist, Waajeed (Platinum Pied Pipers, Slum Village), on the BBC radio show Diversion. "I was absolutely blown away and bugged Waajeed for the band's contact info immediately (he was live on the air at about 1 a.m., UK time!) ... The staggering, gritty beats were just so right, they had a cosmic soulful vibe that reminded me of classic Charles Stepney productions (Rotary Connection, Minnie Riperton, Earth, Wind & Fire, etc.) but was also very forward-thinking and unlike anything else out there."

My own initial reaction to a club DJ dropping a CD-R of "Glorious" was equally immediate: after a night spent propping up the wall, I frantically launched myself onto the dance floor – much to the dismay of those in the immediate vicinity who couldn't properly appreciate my Bobby Brown pre-rehab skills.

Keith is a little cagey when it comes to divulging just how SA-RA create their music. We talk about the inspiration found in crate-digging, and I want to know the strangest record they found that influenced a SA-RA track, but Keith just chuckles. "You know what? It's a secret. Sorry!"

Whatever is lurking in their vault, SA-RA's love of rare finds doesn't mean you'll hear sampled loops on their cuts. The high fees for sampling rights make it unfeasible, although Keith also believes it's not necessary for the kind of music they make.

"A strong musician is able to listen to records ... for textures, for chord changes and intervals," he explains, "when you're able to break down records in the sense that you say, 'I'm not just going to sample this; I'm going to study it, and learn that there are things that I can pull from this, maybe just one chord.' Anything from a record can drive us, but definitely our drums all come from digging."

Keith isn't talking about taking an entire drum break and dropping it into a SA-RA composition – he's talking about finding that one perfect snare, the brightest high hat, and building a drum kit beat by beat.

This isn't an unheard-of technique, yet it's clear that the trio's individual histories of studio work with the likes of Eightball, Mobb Deep, and Ice-T mean they collectively bring some serious knowledge. Part of what makes SA-RA's amazing sound is their ability to build tracks with a microscopic attention to detail and add the subtle shifts and hesitations that make it come alive, elevating SA-RA songs above the common commercial fare with which they're well equipped to compete. The bass line to "Glorious" stutters, then halts, pulling your ear close to its nubbled texture before taking off again, swaggering as it holds your attention. "Death of a Star," a more up-tempo funk song, which Chicago house legend Roy Davis Jr. has described as "a jam session with Prince and Bootsy Collins," reveals deep layers of production that appear and disappear within the space of a few bars, almost subconsciously animating a seemingly straightforward, sing-along track.

Brilliant, often unconventional songs that are still commercially viable, from a band with both underground and industry hype? Seems a little too much to hope for, but what's not to love when Keith promises a SA-RA live show with all three members singing, the ubiquitous laptop, live instruments, and backup singers? If SA-RA are only a tenth as "fashionable, freaky, sexual" as he claims, I can't wait.

SA-RA perform with Lizz Fields Oct. 21, 10 p.m., Mighty, 119 Utah, S.F. Call for price. (415) 626-7001.