Snazzy fedoras and a brass section can't hide Royal Crown Revue's tough-guy heart. On their varied and witty fourth album, The Contender, this swinging Los Angeles septet subjects the Rat Pack revival to its self-proclaimed "adversary stance," spieling about boxing, small-time criminal activities, fallen starlets and Marlon Brando. And they rock, mastering complicated beats at fast tempos, using horns for gallivanting hooks more than for gratuitous honks.

A couple of tracks come off like perfunctory genre workouts, but soul-timbred backing vocals, from blue-beat revivalists Hepcat, and newfound Caribbean lilts add a welcome island breeze. Expressing a headstrong resonance that recalls the Blasters' Phil Alvin, Eddie Nichols miraculously moans "Stormy Weather" into bittersweet freshness. And the gallantly squawked bebop attempt "Salt Peanuts" should tie fedoraclad Generation X swing dancers into well-deserved granny knots.

Slavering about Slim Jims "for your masticating pleasure" or reminiscing over a 1947 Brooklyn Dodgers team photo, Nichols has a talent for spoken raps as well. Packed with seedy characters named Benny the Shoe and Geronimo, the four-minute pulp novel "Friday the 13th" could almost be early Tom Waits. "Zip Gun Bop," revived from RCR's second album, Mugzy's Move, even opens with the same bass line as Mantronix's Eighties electro-hip-hop hit "Ladies." If you don't dance, Nichols promises, his side arm will smoke you into minestrone. (RS 796)

CHUCK EDDY