Red Heaven (1992)

Its opaque, moody lyrics notwithstanding, Throwing Muses' 1991 ''The Real Ramona'' was a hot-pink, zebra-striped whirligig of a record. As the band flirted with fizzy, girl-group pop, its aura of overseriousness fell away like water off lettuce leaves in a salad spinner. The disappointingly inert Red Heaven doesn't yield so readily to the charms of centrifugal force. Lead singer/songwriter Kristin Hersh's threadbare lyrics (''Hot things move him, I write on his wall'') could have been written by poorly designed artificial-intelligence software. The band's glorious guitar sound wraps around songs as if it were a screen of fine metal mesh. It's a resonant, burnished sound, but it isn't quite enough to dress up Throwing Muses' gloomy cloak of self-importance.

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