Every once in a while, a band comes along that successfully takes the sounds that influenced it a step further rather than simply re-creating something from the past. The Los Angeles-based band known as theSTART - made up of vocalist Aimee Echo and drummer Scott Ellis formerly of the underground band Human Waste Project, former Snot drummer Jamie Miller on guitars and synthesizers, and Jeff Jaeger on bass - is one of those bands, taking post-punk, synth pop and new wave influences ranging from Devo and Siouxsie and the Banshees to the Buzzcocks and Fugazi, along with the pop sensibilities of the Beatles, and creating a forward-thinking sound that is truly original.

With Echo's raspy sassiness backed by spacey keyboard and synth textures, shimmering guitars, and flourishes of cyber industrial beats and noises, theSTART brings to mind classic new wave bands like Missing Persons and the Cure without sounding dated or uninspired. In other words, theSTART is, I guess, post-new wave.

"The characterization of new wave is, I think, there is no such thing as new wave," says Echo of being compared to such bands. "I think that new wave was what they called punk rock when the musicianship got better and you added extra instruments. New wave was the original alternative - it was different from your regular, three-chord bashing punk rock."

Echo says a better description for theSTART's sound is one coined by Pete Shelley in a Buzzcocks biography she read. That phrase was "next wave."

"Actually, it was a paragraph about how if we don't continue to push the envelope and get to the next wave, we'll all die," she recalls. "So, we really try to make a concerted effort to stay away from anything that's current and anything that we've done before."

"We really do try, but we have short attention spans," she adds jovially.

Perhaps that's why theSTART cannot be compared to any current sounds or lumped into categories like nu-metal, post-punk, or alterna-pop. The bands ability to escape popular trends can also be credited to Echo's song-writing style on the debut release Shakedown! , which mixes themes of love, infatuation, and jealousy ("Gorgeous," "Melt," "Her Song," "Time") with the more uplifting concepts of being proud of one's individuality and making the best of what you have ("Shakedown!," "Kiss It Better"). And these are ideas most singers, male or female, have trouble expressing these days.

"Nobody talks about love anymore," Echo claims. "I admire men who can write brilliant love songs and aren't afraid to talk about their women. Boys that are in touch with their femininity all the way back to Bowie, all the way back to the Beatles for Christ sakes! Kurt Cobain, Perry Farrell - he talked about his girl and it's still rocking!"

"Enough of this 'bodies hit the floor,'" she continues. "I don't want to hear about it. Not that I want to hear about all love quotes either, but let's get some diversity."

Diversity seems to be something theSTART embraces - from the band's logo, a symbol that stands for accepting others for who they are, to Echo's ability to write about alien abduction and make it sound like a love song ("Communion"), theSTART wants to bring people together with its music and ideas. Echo says it was diversity that made summer festival tours like Lollapalooza something special, and that's something she feels is missing from most of today's music festivals.

"That's what the beauty of the Lollapalooza concerts were was that there was something that was different," she remembers. "Also, I remember the diversity of the crowd - you had a rap guy sitting next to a guy in a skirt, for Christ sakes! That was beautiful, that was incredible. It made me happy."

Hopefully, Echo was happy to join this summer's Vans Warped Tour, on which the band finished its stint last month. To find out what theSTART is up to now, go to www.thisisthestart.com or www.thestart.org.

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