In the arsenal of effects units available on a sound desk, I wonder if there is a preset marked municipal hall/swimming pool?

Because if there is, Nikolai and The Physicists were, for some reason, awarded this effect in stereo. In spite of the setback, Nikolai snagged us with what they do so well - they take mundane subjects (like a girl from Johnston, Scrabble and a dog) and turn them into songs whose melodies catch hold, sink their teeth into you and never readily release their grip.

It was an all-out elemental aural assault when it came to the three-girl, one-guy, confrontational punk of The Physicists. Bossy, itchy and passionate, they brought old school punk bang up to date with a funked-up sleaze edge, as they hurtled into buzzy thrashes and sulphurous snarls.

The spirit of demonic possession was present in their wildly wilful fireball of a front-woman Sal, who managed to be both threatening and alluring at the same time. Her vocal style was a mixture of scowl, growl, and screech as she ate up the lyrics and spat them out - ruptured ear drums part of the deal.

Some people just don't get the The Physicists, but, trust me, they are well worth paying attention to.

The energy and immediacy of Adequate 7's live performance doesn't in any way transpose itself onto disc, so you're left with a thin sounding album (Songs Of Innocence And Of Experience) that tries to pass itself off as genre-splicing, but to me sounds like a band without a clear sense of direction.

There is no doubting their live performance ability to throw a clutch of genres into the mix and make them bounce. They take a fat slab of brassed up funk and punk, hook it onto the repetitiveness of dance, borrow hip-hop's dynamics, chuck in the industrial chug of metal, add on a wiry, mouthy frontman and some extremely tight musicianship, so it should be a recipe for something amazing.

The band are more than adequate and there are seven of them, but I found Adequate 7 a little difficult to love. I had the 'experience but I missed the meaning'.

MOLL