***
Through the Sun Door's cover art--occult icons, animal figures, casual photos, and religious symbols jammed together on a tabletop--hints at White Magic's gift for distilling a wild mix of influences into their own strange brew. The opener on their Through the Sun Door EP, "One-Note," finds Quix*o*tic's Mira Billotte navigating an unusual melody over an off-kilter, hypnotic groove worthy of Robert Wyatt. Martial drumming, snaky bass, and mysterious piano flourishes set the stage for a cover of "Plain Gold Ring" that echoes the lonely drama of Nina Simone's classic version. Then there's the warped boogie of "Apocalypse," which gets bent further by Billotte's vocal leaps. On "Don't Need," the group morphs into a country-cabaret act gigging at a macabre renaissance fair. Two tracks lack appeal--"The Gypsies Came Marching After" comes off like an overly complicated sketch and "Keeping the Wolves from the Door" is hippie-inflected indie rock--but Sun Door is still one of the year's more intriguing discs. FRED CISTERNA

THE NEW YEAR

The End Is Near

(Touch and Go)

****
Newness Ends, 2001's debut from the New Year, is an album the phrase "hard to take" doesn't even begin to describe. It is a tearjerker, encompassing loneliness, the wish for loneliness, and the triumph of loneliness. Depending on your mood, it can make you weep with emptiness or satisfaction (a memorable lyric: "One plus one/minus one/equals one/it was over/even before it had begun"). The band, which features Bedhead's Kadane brothers, comes back tugging at heartstrings again with The End Is Near, and like its predecessor, you simply cannot listen to it any other way than from beginning to end, just holding on for the emotional ride. However, there is no simper, no whine, and no poopy-panted tantrums. Each pretty--and I mean very pretty--song, just as on the last album, finds the singer having learned a lesson, and drummer Chris Brokaw deftly drives that point deep into the listener's heart. From "Age of Conceit": "Last week I would have said there's no way/today I'm giving in/I don't believe in what I now have to believe in/but no one sees an end to the end... give me back my childhood/let me keep my beard/I'll be a freakish little man." See what I mean? This is sadness in motion, without the wallow. KATHLEEN WILSON

THE GIFT OF GAB

4th Dimensional Rocketships Going Up

(Quannum Projects)

****
Gift of Gab's debut, 4th Dimensional Rocketships Going Up, was recorded in Seattle and produced by local beat designers Jake One and Vitamin D. The CD is to Seattle's hiphop scene what the Central Library is to Seattle's architecture: 4th Dimensional Rocketships Going Up is a major local and national event. Gift of Gab's raps are, as always (he is a member of Blackalicious), dense and intricate; it's as if he wanted to pack every little detail in the known universe into the CD. The intricacies of the raps are reflected by the intricacies of the beats. Each track is carefully designed and luxuriously spaced. There is no rush, no panic to find a hit or a hook, but a patience and consideration (in both the standard and the etymological sense of that word--to gaze at the stars) that are informed by a profound professionalism. Precision and proficiency shaped the substance of 4th Dimensional Rocketships Going Up. CHARLES MUDEDE

BUMBLEBEEZ 81

The Printz EPs

Modular Recordings/Geffen

****
In the same way that the Beastie Boys, Beck, and Gorillaz broke ground in the mainstream by hooking hiphop to punk and indie rock (among other musical flavors), Chris Colonna, the mastermind behind Bumblebeez 81, also stomps through genre pools and splashes their contents together. The native Australian's American debut, The Printz EPs, is a combination of lo-fi, bedroom-recording indie rock (sounding, on "Come Ova," a lot like the Pixies) and loud, jerky roller coasters of laptop-fried hiphop, drum 'n' bass, and funk. It's a purposely tangled, sonically splattered collage (Colonna has named as his influences visual artists such as Jean-Michel Basquiat) that provides no empty space to stop or unpeel textures layered thick as house paint. The CD, which moves at the frenetic pace of a dirgy dance-floor hit, comprises two of his earlier Australian and English releases, White Printz and Red Printz, and should appeal to both the arty, underground commotion of GSL/Three-One-G label fans as well as those who appreciate noisy, left-field hiphop (Colonna's kid sister, Pia, raps some witty zingers on a couple of tracks). JENNIFER MAERZ