The hook is the prized commodity of all pop music, the elusive
ingredient that determines a song's palatability. But for
Seattle foursome Welcome, the hook is less a metaphorical
construct than a literal one-- a sharp, pointy thing that lures
you in by breaking skin and drawing blood.  Their Fat Cat debut,
Sirs, pulls off the neat trick of feeling more accessible and
immediate than it really is. For indie rock fans who came of age
during the mid-90s, the album will make you wistful for an era
when Sub Pop was banking on the Grifters and Spoon were just a
quaint little Pixies rip-off. Opener "All Set" provides an
instant microcosm of Welcome's slop-pop ethos, an exercise in
mod madness that's knocked askew by wobbly Keith Moon tom-tom
rolls and out-of-tune guitar shards that fortuitously converge
into a roiling riff, the end result sounding not unlike the
Creation's "Making Time" with every second note removed.
There's an unabated momentum to these songs, which twitch and
shout their way to the finish line in