Pesky

On the Web site for the Kansas City-based label Closed System, visitors can download and remix selections from Pesky's An Effort to Do Good. It's a win-win situation: Surfers get free tunes without incurring the RIAA's wrath, and Pesky's songs might get the help they so desperately need. Insubstantial as a mild breeze, the group's output leaves few footprints. Its guitars, all jangle and no jolt, sound castrated; its harmonies magnify the mildness of each singer's voice; and the rhythm section tiptoes tamely through the tunes like a teen trying not to wake his parents after curfew. Pesky does itself no favors by covering Magnetic Fields -- hearing its vocalist recite Stephin Merritt's wry, self-deprecating lines feels as forced and uncomfortable as hearing a small child blurt obscenities. In most cases, remixes are frivolous cosmetic surgery, but Pesky needs an extreme makeover to correct its terminal blandness.