Matthew Caws of Nada Surf rattles off dirty knock-knock jokes like a high school geek. Here's an unfortunate example:

"Knock, knock."
"Who's there?"|

"Fuck."
"Fuck who?"

"Don't you mean 'Fuck whom'?"

Caws is just full of mirth. He snickers about his band's limited radio success; he cackles about being the black sheep of the music industry; and then he slips in another sophomoric joke -- this one starring the Pope. Question is will the laughter cease when the world hears The Proximity Effect, the band's follow-up to 1996's major-label debut, High/Low, due out September 22?

Best and maybe only known for the pubescent anthem "Popular," which espoused "three important rules for breaking up," Nada Surf have taken baby steps away from their tongue-in-cheek pop rock identity. That said, the first single from The Proximity Effect shamelessly reprises the pubescent prater and Fisher-Price hooks that propped "Popular." "Why Are You So Mean To Me?" reads like a bitter sequel to the band's only hit, with Caws asking over and over again why high school girls have to be so darn bitchy -- a bit silly for a trio of guys almost old enough to have high-school daughters.

The guitar-driven Proximity Effect does reach for relevance with "Mother's Day," a gutsy song about date rape that took Caws nearly two months to write. Putting his teenage street credibility to good use, Caws sings about a crime that young men simply do not discuss: "On your Star Wars sheets/When you set the scene/Was she seducing you?/Or did she want to scream? ... You'll feel good for ten seconds/She'll be screwed up for life."

"It's amazing that we spent so much time on this song because musically it's not like anything we would do," Caws says. "But during the process of trying to write another radio hit I got to thinking about what it meant to make a song that every single thirteen-year-old in the nation will know. I thought about what I would say to some kid if I had his attention for three-and-a-half minutes."

The new album was recorded at Avatar Studios in New York and the Palindrome in Venice Beach, Calif., with Fred Maher, who has produced albums for Lou Reed, Luna and Mary Lou Lord. Infusing Nada Surf's music with more catchy hooks and pop appeal, Maher effectively filled the shoes left behind by former Cars frontman Ric Ocasek, who produced High/Low nearly three years ago.

"The first album was really good, but we bulldozed through it with one sound," Caws says. "With this album we were more concerned with the construction of songs, and making them tight."

Whether they admit it or not, Nada Surf were also concerned with the sophomore slump, which strikes dozens of Seven Mary Threes and Candleboxes each year. The group will promote this album into the ground, diligently tour the globe and attempt to ignore those who believe they're catering to the lowest common denominator.

"We weren't nervous about beating High/Low, we just wanted to do something as good as that," Caws says. "Our moms really like this record, so we're many-hit wonders to them." Awwww.

ANNI LAYNE(September 1, 1998)