KING
Belly (Sire/Reprise 45833)
It's easy to understand why people have such great expectations for Belly. This quartet would seem to have all the ingredients for alternarock stardom: Obvious ambition; an attractive, mixed-gender lineup; an approachable, guitar-based sound; an impressive heritage, thanks to Tanya Donelly's days with Throwing Muses; and a solid track record, courtesy the 1993 hit "Feed the Tree." All Belly needs to complete the picture are great new songs -- something the group's second album, "King," just doesn't deliver. True, "Puberty" gets the album off to a jangly, mildly raucous start, and "Now They'll Sleep" has enough power-pop appeal to keep most listeners happy. But there's nothing especially compelling about those tunes, while the album's other songs rarely manage more than enough bland competence to keep you from forgetting that the stereo's still on. If "King" is the best the band can do, it looks like this Belly is mostly empty.
BOYS ON THE SIDE
Original Soundtrack (Arista 18748)
What better way to complement a female buddy flick than with an all-girl soundtrack? That seems to be the thinking behind the "Boys on the Side" album. With a lineup that stretches from Bonnie Raitt to Sarah McLachlan to the Indigo Girls, it could almost be taken as a sort of Who's Who of women in rock. Granted, it doesn't exactly stand as the best of the genre, as Sheryl Crow's tuneful-but-slight "Keep On Growing" has "leftover" written all over it, while Jonell Mosser's Cream-by-numbers rendition of "Crossroads" is a total waste of timer. Still, there are wonderful moments here as well, including Raitt's luminous reading of Roy Orbison's "You Got It," and the Pretenders' evocative remake of Morrissey's gorgeously melancholy "Everyday Is Like Sunday." Now, if they'd dropped Whoopi Goldberg's version of "You Got It," they'd really have it.
LET'S GO
Rancid (Epitaph 86434)
Remember the sound of "White Riot"-period Clash? The members of Rancid certainly do. "Let's Go" sounds astonishingly like the reincarnation of the Clash's first album, from the ragged, Joe Strummer-ish vocals on "Nihilism" to the brash, tuneful chorus that sparks "Salvation." Trouble is, Rancid is so keen on reanimating the past that it doesn't manage to bring much of the present to its music. Oh, sure, the lyrics make vaguely topical references to the labor politics ("Harry Bridges") and the contemporary Southern California punk scene (on the title tune), but even these seem to have been offered less as original expression than as an attempt to recapture the spirit of '77 (though Rancid does deserve credit for copping the chorus to "Burn" from the rap oldie "The Roof Is on Fire"). Seriously, do we really need a punk rock version of the Stray Cats?