Les Georges Leningrad

This Montreal trio hasn't exactly leapt aboard the bandwagon barreling through their hometown: Unlike the Arcade Fire or the Dears or any other of the 436 Montreal acts currently inspiring American curiosity, Les Georges Leningrad doesn't trade in extravagantly arranged art pop with lots of swoony guitars and larger-than-life emotions.

Instead, on Sur les Traces de Black Eskimo, their second album, they make hyperactively deranged disco-punk whose relationship with melody is about as steady as frontwoman Poney P.'s command of English. (Plus, they wear costumes sometimes made of paper.) When they're really on, they sound like Le Tigre before the wheatgrass shots: "Supa Doopa" rides a killer synth-bass squelch, "Sponsorships" has lots of assertive ride-cymbal clang, and "Black Eskimo" could be the theme song to the world's easiest game show. When slightly less coherent, Les Georges Leningrad sounds like a bunch of junior-high kids ransacking the school orchestra's storage room: If they unwisely threaten to play "St. Mary's Memorial Hall," escape to the bar and don't look back.