** The Prissteens

PASSION, CONTROVERSY & ROMANCE

(Almo Sounds)

The Prissteens sounded like a garage rocker's dream when they first played the Middle East last year. Although heavily steeped in the '60s, they weren't a cute girl-group update or a new-wave throwback. They were genuine "Louie Louie" disciples with a perfect grasp of three-chord trash -- and they didn't waste time convincing you how sexy they were. If someone had produced it right, their major-label debut could have been like the Donnas' album, only better.

Unfortunately, veteran producers Richard Gottehrer and Jeffrey Loesser appear to have decided that Passion, Controversy & Romance should sound as much like a Joan Jett album as possible. The guitars are too soft and the vocals are too loud. There are a pair of too-obvious covers, the Pretty Things' "Sorrow" and Wreckless Eric's "Go the Whole Wide World" -- already covered by, respectively, David Bowie and the Monkees. And the disc's bubblegum polish makes the band sound like, yes, a girl-group update and new-wave throwback. All's not lost: the opening tune, "The Hound," is three minutes of pure mania, with flying hormones, screams aplenty, three big chords, and one of the most concise love stories ever told. Then the album settles into an enjoyable but respectable '60s sound, as if the Prissteens were too scared of the teenage monster they'd just unleashed.

-- Brett Milano