Sheilas take a bow

>> Four-eyed faux Brits the Sheila Divine

by CHRIS YURKIW

They're a pop-rock trio called the Sheila Divine. The leader emotes like Thom Yorke and slashes out heaviosity on his guitar in a tight and tidy way like Swervedriver. All three are partial to horn-rims and look like the Proclaimers with young bro' in tow.

Got it: post-Radiohead Britrock sincerity. When's the phoner? What's the guy's name? But wait! A little attention reveals that the band is actually "breaking out of New England." Not the old one. Shit. Now the angle is gonna hafta be their glasses. It's weak, but I can work with it.

Chatting with frontman Aaron Perrino, however, does reveal a mitigated Brit connection. It seems that Perrino grew up in Buffalo and was inordinately influenced by the Brit-heavy heyday of Toronto's ol' "commercial alternative" radio station CFNY, as it wafted over Lake Ontario.

"Yeah," says Perrino, "that's the music I really liked growing up. I was definitely influenced by early and late '80s British music. Yeah, we do get mistaken a lot. I take it as a compliment."

Okay, so a faux Britband based in Boston could be seen as a funny shtick (and while we're at it, could they be a faux gay band as well? They took the "Sheila" part from Aussie slang for "girl/wuss" and everyone remembers Divine). But they have another incongruity to overcome: their label is Roadrunner, known for near-decades now as a premiere purveyor of all that is metallic, from Sepultura to Type O Negative.

"They're branching out now," says Perrino of Roadrunner, "and we're kind of the guinea pig. They did have this British band Drugstore, but other than that they haven't had anything near us. They're still a metal label."

A metal label that finally wants to get into the radio game, and when they asked the Sheilas to write a hit song, Perrino came up with "Hum," an anti-commercial-radio rant that has (nonetheless? self-referentially?) been ear-marked as the first "priority track" from the group's debut album, The New Parade. Oh, isn't it ironic? But is it good for us? And what about those glasses?

"We all do wear glasses--it's just one of those things," sighs Perrino. "And now [the record company] is like 'Oh, it's such a good image seller!' But yeah, it's not a gimmick."

It is now.

With Marlowe at le Petit Campus tonight, Thursday, August 19, 8:30pm, $5