If the Los Angeles underground has one unifying factor today, it's Redd Kross. Lynchpins of the local club circuit for over 15 years, the McDonald brothers' high-spirited anthems have something for everyone. Metalheads, punks, ironic indie-rockers, pop cultists -- they all come together under the Redd Kross banner, joining hands (figuratively, at least) to cheer on the grinning gurus of the Sunset Strip.

Of course, tell Jeff and Steve McDonald this, and they just roll their eyes.

"Oh, there are people who hate us," Jeff says proudly. "They're jealous because we've been around forever. We're the Flamin Groovies of Los Angeles, essentially, and some people can't deal with that because they can't keep it together for more than five years."

"See, he just paid you such a nice compliment, and then you turned it into this thing where you're defending and retaliating," Steve scolds Jeff, as we trade volleys around a table at Mercury headquarters.

"I didn't bad-rap anyone for five years, and now it's gonna start," Jeff teases back. "No more false humility. I think we are the band that everyone loves. We heard that No Doubt wanted us to tour with them. I was extremely excited. If they like us, we must be cool." He laughs.

Fair enough. Of course, there's one thing missing from this golden success story -- yup, record sales. Despite an irresistible string of acclaimed releases, Redd Kross have never hit that career-making jackpot, watching their peers rise to mainstream stardom while they're still trying to find a label who won't dump them at the first sign of trouble. That elusive breakthrough still weighs heavily in the McDonalds' thoughts.

It could be just a question of timing. As Redd Kross has evolved from bratty punk to strutting rock to gritty pop, their sound has always been tragically out of sync with the times. During the peak of jangly college-rock, they released the hard-driving Neurotica. By the time the grunge world caught up with Neurotica, the band had moved onto the sunny pop of Third Eye. They always seem an inch ahead or behind the game.

"Never behind," protests Steve.

"No, no, that's not true," Jeff argues. "Ten years behind, twenty ahead. That's been our major malfunction. That's why we don't have a platinum album. But you know what? If we had a platinum album, people would hate us. And people hate you for not having a platinum album. It's a double-edged sword."

"Yeah, but the fans and critics like you for not having a platinum album," counters Steve. "It's the industry that hates you. I don't know, maybe we're sabotaging ourselves. Maybe it is just that we're ahead or behind all at the same time. Or maybe it's The Man's fault for not knowing what to do with us."

Whatever their past problems, Redd Kross have now launched their latest bid for global dominance, Show World. It's the first time they've released consecutive discs on the same label. The players also remain stable, though Phaseshifter keyboardist Gere Fennelly is now a contributor rather than an official member. Guitarist Eddie Kurdziel and drummer Brian Reitzell complete the current lineup.

Show World may be the perfect compromise between the bubblegum of Third Eye and the grinding rock of Phaseshifter. Arguably the group's most consistent release ever, Show World spans the pure pop pleasures of "Mess Around" and "One Chord Progression," the metallic rumbles of "Kiss The Goat" and "Teen Competition," a roaring cover of the Quick's "Pretty Please Me" and even two epic power ballads (one, an unlikely tribute to actress Sara Gilbert). However, while the McDonalds' wry vision of pop culture often propels the songs, the downcast tone of tracks like "Vanity Mirror," "Ugly Town" and "Get Out Of Myself" clearly reflects some deeper frustrations.

"I think at least three of us suffered nervous breakdowns between records," admits chief songwriter Jeff. "It's very chic in rock 'n' roll, and it's OK."

"I wouldn't say that it's chic," corrects Steve. "I would say it's anar-chic."

"Yeah, it's very anar-chic," Jeff continues playfully. "That's part of success. You have to have a nervous breakdown. I mean, you want to get away. You're tired of being famous. This is about rock 'n' roll, post-grunge. There's a lot of anxiety involved, just playing guitar in a rock band."

"That's a good headline: 'Anxiety in the Post-Grunge Era,'" grins Steve.

"Believe me," Jeff says, "when you talk to a lot of the groups that have been around for three years, you'll see that as a common thread: post-grunge anxiety. We went through a self-imposed, grunge identity crisis."

Yet does that fully explain the three-year break between albums? After all, there were no legal snafus or personnel swaps to overcome, for once.

"Well, we toured for a year and a half after the last record came out," Jeff points out, "plus a year and a half before it came out."

"Right, we were touring forever," Steve continues. "We toured for like three years solid. Seriously. So we took a break. We also wanted to write a really, really strong pop record, so we did that as well. And then Jeff had lots of stuff happening in his life...."

"We made a record called Black Shampoo, and we weren't happy with it," adds Jeff, who gained a wife (former Go-Go Charlotte Caffey) and a daughter during the hiatus. "We went back and wrote a bunch more songs, and recorded Show World. So we recorded two albums in the span of this one record. But the other one you'll only see on bootleg. I'm sure it'll come out somehow. Check it out."

Asking Redd Kross about their songwriting is always risky. It requires a daring trip to the very heart of McDonaldland, that mythical realm of cross-references where HR Pufnstuf, Lita Ford, the Little Rascals, Sonny & Cher, the Brady Bunch, Mike Ness, the Bugaloos, Blue Oyster Cult, Josie & the Pussycats, Kitaro, Boyce & Hart, the B-52's and Paul McCartney all live together in beaming, utopian harmony. And yes, all these names (and many more) were mentioned during this chat. Still, "Kiss The Goat" has the strangest inspiration of all.

"It's about Satan," Jeff states simply. "We've never done a Satanic song, but it's more about the '60s Satanic movement. There was this whole Satan pop culture happening in California in the late '60s. Read The Family, by Ed Sanders. It isn't about Charles Manson, but there's like this whole memoir about it. There was just tons of this hippie, stripper, Satanic-stripper-hippie, drug-culture trip. And 'Kiss The Goat' is part of the Black Mass ritual."

Steve clears his throat stuffily. "Do you feel comfortable promoting that? There's a lot of impressionable teens...."

"Oh, it's not pro-Satan at all," Jeff scoffs. "I don't even believe in Satan."

As for "Teen Competition," Jeff says, "That song is one of the few fictional pieces on the record. It's actual fiction. It's about a group of Billy Corgan admirers. The rest is self-explanatory."

"You actually referenced Billy Corgan?" queries Steve, again putting on his interviewer's hat.

"I don't think there's any 'reference,' just to the witchy qualities of the person whom they admire," Jeff decides. "And Billy Corgan is a very witchy, essential-oils kind of guy. He's like Stevie Nicks in the '70s. He's kind of a minor, more male version of Stevie Nicks."

"But you can't slag him," says Steve. "He revels in that. He even did a 'Landslide' cover."

"Wow," says Jeff, genuinely surprised. "I didn't even know he did 'Landslide.' I just was drawing my own connections."

"It was on that record of B-sides, or whatever," says Kurdziel, briefly speaking up from the other side of the table. Pisces...."

"Pisces, Aquarius, Dolenz, Jones And Corgan, Limited," deadpans Steve.

The hidden track "Sick Love" also whirls the McDonalds into debate, as they ponder lines like "Build me up, tear me down/Be your clown/Be a prophet for six months now/Then kick me out."

"That's a really British-influenced song," says Jeff. "I dunno, what is that song about? It's not about love in a relationship...."

"Actually, it started off as me writing about getting into a relationship," Steve fills in. "But by the time the song made it to the record, it had been filtered through the Jeff songwriting process also, and Jeff had been feeling really bitter about the new Suede album not selling well or something. So that became part of the song too."

"So that song is about Steven's girlfriend and Brett Anderson," Jeff sums up. "It's kind of a hodgepodge."

The most unexpected track on Show World is certainly "My Secret Life," a towering, Phil Spector-like, strings-'n'-things lament.

"Well, 'Secret Life' is one of those songs that I had a lot to do with writing," says Steve. "I was thinking of Dusty Springfield when I wrote it. We didn't go so much for a Wall of Sound as we just went for that 'grand' feel. The timpani, and all that. I guess it skates that line between 'River Deep, Mountain High' and Dusty in Memphis. Oh, and there's a tad of Sound Magazine. That's the third Partridge Family album, which is actually kind of like the third Velvet Underground album."

Kurdziel moans and rolls his eyes. Everyone laughs. Jeff apologizes for the comparison. "He's a purist," Jeff explains, as if revealing a dark secret.

Kurdziel's reaction might illustrate what keeps Redd Kross out of the Top 40 -- the kitschy, goofy quality of their music. The same campiness which endears the band to their fans may alienate the young Lollapalooza generation, who usually favors a less arch, more dour world view.

"I always wrote serious songs, but the silly ones overshadowed the serious ones," defends Jeff. "And even the silly ones were serious. I'm not joking here. I use humor, but they're always very personal and honest. Always."

The fight to be taken seriously is nothing new to the McDonalds. It's a war that has been raging ever since they founded the band as children, and dared to open for hardened punk acts like Black Flag wearing the tackiest in Goodwill-bin fashions.

"Our whole image was created by not thinking about what we were doing, just wearing anything that looked freaky," Jeff remembers. "In our world, we realized it was punk. We were staying with the true spirit of what we believed punk rock to be. But punkers were spitting on us and throwing things. We were as influenced by Mary Hartman as we were by Johnny Thunders, and people didn't understand it."

The crowds eventually caught onto the joke, and Redd Kross became a beloved stalwart of the Hollywood scene. Yet none of the group's '80s records crossed over to a wider audience -- in fact, some of them aren't even in print anymore, including the pivotal Neurotica.

"Our hope about all those old records is to slowly get them back," grumbles Jeff. "But I don't even want to talk about those records. It's a nightmare. It gives me a stomach ache every time I think about them. That's the damage from our youth. We were irresponsible. We didn't know what we were doing."

"That's what happens when you're a pot-smoking teenager, and you're recording records and signing contracts," laughs Steve. "We made great records, but the legal side of it was a disaster. Eventually, we'd like to have it all in a decent catalog."

If Show World becomes a world-class hit, controlling that back catalog might be within reach. And finally, the rest of the country will know what Los Angeles has known for years.

"It's weird," smiles Steve. "I guess we have the underdog vote, because we've yet to have our platinum album. It would be great if everyone felt proud of us. But I would love to be in one of those bands that everyone hates because we're so damn successful also."

If that No Doubt/Redd Kross tour happens, they'll have plenty to talk about.

By: Eric Broome