7 Sisters

When L7 played its first hometown show in almost a year—in a bowling-alley cocktail lounge in a Los Angeles neighborhood bad enough to keep the industry weasels away—they carried their own equipment onstage and sold T-shirts afterward, just as they did when they were a sweaty, unknown grunge band on a tiny punk-rock label. This has been a big year for the band: they became favorites of Beavis and Butt-head, sported jaunty codpieces in Serial Mom, and freaked out David Letterman. When they were on tour last year with Nirvana in Brazil, fans dug through ashtrays for L7-smoked cigarette butts to press in their keepsake albums. Now coming this month from Slash is L7's Hungry for Stink, a piquant, guitar-heavy follow-up to the Smell the Magic EP they recorded for Sub Pop, and possibly the album that will break them beyond their riff-ravenous underground cult. "It's not just Brazil," deadpans bassist Jennifer Finch. "For some reason, we're also really big in Finland."

JONATHAN GOLD