Review: Hum and the unlikely second act of an alt-rock band at the Regent

The band Hum is best known as a ‘90s footnote. Most alt-rock radio listeners might be hard-pressed to draw a distinction between the Champaign, Ill., band and Silverchair, Failure or any number of one-word guitar bands that were swept into the major label feeding frenzy of the post-grunge era.

These groups were maybe lucky enough to catch on with single radio hit (1995’s “Stars,� in Hum’s case), but typically ended their run with a quiet slide into cutout bin obscurity.

So why did Hum’s sold-out show at the Regent on Thursday night – the band’s first Los Angeles appearance in more than 15 years -- feel like a victory lap?

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Mixing churning and often complex guitar textures and crisp melodies around lyrics steeped with science and space travel, Hum was too lyrically esoteric to be emo, too Midwestern clean-cut for metal and simply too late to get swept into the early ‘90s shoegaze scene.

The band’s major label debut, “You’d Prefer an Astronaut,� sold some 250,000 copies on the strength of “Stars,� and Hum released the more ambitious follow-up “Downward Is Heavenward� in 1998. A lost classic, the album disappeared on the sales charts, and Hum was eventually dropped from RCA. During Hum’s last West Coast tour that same year, a van accident resulted in canceled dates and, ultimately, the end of the band.

Meanwhile, Hum’s shadow grew far larger than its contemporaries. In a 2010 interview, the Deftones’ Chino Moreno cited Hum as a key influence, and you can hear echoes of the band’s textured yet heavy mix in buzzy recent metal favorites Deafheaven.

Lately, the band has existed only periodically, including a few festival dates in 2011, but this year marked its first cross-country tour since the ‘90s.

Onstage at the Regent, Hum looked roughly indistinguishable from its crowd -- an aesthetic true to the decade they came out of. Though today’s modern rock, such that it is, has moved well beyond the kind of down-to-earth authenticity of the alt-rock era (something that, inevitably, grew to become its own kind of artifice), there was something comforting about seeing that sort of onstage everyman again.

The band served as a loud, furiously efficient reminder that anyone who may otherwise pass by unnoticed on the street could become someone else entirely by conjuring a truly unholy racket onstage and, by extension, you could too. In the stratified, seen-it-all pop landscape of 2015, it’s an idea that seems as revolutionary as it is quaint.

Opening with the slow-burning, shimmering drone of “Little Dipper,� Hum’s set at the Regent revealed the ferocious metallic heart that’s long lurked beneath its sweet melodies and space-rock textures.

“Comin’ Home� accelerated through a relentless, bottom-heavy churn of guitars grounded by the even-keeled voice of lead singer/guitarist Matt Talbott, and “Isle of the Cheetah� rose through a grinding swirl of fuzz and noise from Talbott and fellow guitarist Tim Lash, which was offset by an arcing vocal melody that wouldn’t sound out of place on a Morrissey track.

“Iron Clad Lou� and “Scraper� from the band’s gruff 1993 album “Electra 2000� further underscored the group’s aggressive underpinnings, which prompted Talbott to sheepishly admit after a raw-throated conclusion that he really wasn’t that upset anymore. “I’d Like Your Hair Long� sped through a sparkling, off-kilter structure, and “Stars� flexed Hum’s deft hand with the quiet-loud dynamics that made the Pixies so influential, leading that band to some belated reunion runs in its own right.

Throughout the night Talbott – resembling a print shop manager with close-cropped hair and glasses bound to his head with an elastic strap – often seemed overwhelmed by the crowd’s warm reception during his few spoken interludes. “The Scientists� closed the evening with stutter-stop guitars and lyrics that, like many of Hum’s songs, reference mysterious technology and launch difficulties, broken by Talbott’s far-reaching, mid-song warning, “it’s too much, you’re too late.�

It’s nearly 20 years after the fact, but for at least one night, he was wrong.

Want to read more but 140-characters at a time? Follow me @chrisbarton.

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