Punk's been co-modified. The only visible women in music are nubile tarts or overtly motherly matrons. And what happened to rock? Does it even exist anymore?

The answer is yeah. Or rather, the Yeah Yeah Yeah's, a New York based three-piece, who's first full-length album, Fever To Tell, brings back the raw vigor of self-imposed creativity minus the over sensationalism or coy sexuality of today's leading debutantes. Get in line, boys, because Karen O tells it like it is, and her band ain't half bad either.

Like a crazy Chrissy Hynde squashed through Thurston Moore's fuzz pedal, Karen O's screaming caterwauls are simultaneously confident and creepy crashing at the intersection of lo-fi and mechanical. The rest of the band is a juxtaposition of avant-garde guitar work, garage feedback and cut-time drums drunk on red-bull and amphetamines. Simply put, the Yeah Yeah Yeah's are what would've happened had Ian Curtis managed an X chromosome and Joy Division been a New York band.

Nowhere is this Bowery and Bleeker Street influence more prominent than on "Cold Light". Mirroing shades of the Velvet Underground, Karen O hauls down loads of straight-on Baudelairian excess to undress her swanky invitations with. There's a distinct melodic undercurrent that, no matter how diffused through processors and analogue distortion, holds Fever To Tell together. Here, even ballads such as "Modern Romance" and "Maps" are strong, suffused with a sturdy backbench for Ms. O to rest her voice upon. No cheap love songs or overly loud monstrosities here, every note, every standing wave is absolutely necessary and only helps to add grandeur to the Yeah Yeah Yeah's overwrought simplicity.

Fever To Tell is an amazing first effort for a band who previously was relegated to the truncated land of e.p.'s. The Yeah Yeah Yeahs don't slip on the common pitfalls associated with albums of similar aspirations. The plagues of tedium and over-experimentalism are wholly absent here, freeing the YYY's to create a sonically challenging canvas that is both mentally demanding yet elaborately refreshing in it's approach. While the puff-cakes of music may be nice to look at, the Yeah Yeah Yeah's implore substance over style. On Fever To Tell, however, they manage plenty of both.

For more info, check out www.yeahyeahyeahs.com