MORCHEEBA

Morcheeba may kick violently against the too-trendy trip-hop tag, yet on Monday night in San Francisco there was no denying the role genre progenitors like Portishead and Massive Attack played in shaping the London group's sound. On its debut, "Who Can You Trust?," Morcheeba champions a style of music as intriguing as it is disposable. The group's core members -- singer Skye Edwards, guitarist Ross Godfrey and DJ Paul Godfrey -- mix postmodern with barbed lyrics to explore the tension of modern life.

\\Live, the group blended sweeping soul melodies with beats and musical elements from the underground club scene like an information-age version of Sade. Unfortunately, the lavish cocktail room setting of Bimbo's gave Morcheeba too many opportunities to slip into a flimsy jazz-funk groove. And rather than work on creating a cohesive mood, Edwards buoyed her band's generic identity by shimmying across the stage and repeatedly announcing "Morcheeba is in the house."

\\If not for the disconcerting roar of audience recognition, Morcheeba's evocative radio hit, "Trigger Hippie," would have sounded like just another acid-jazz jingle. Likewise, many of the group's other songs -- which on disc sound like a sublime meeting between Pink Floyd, Marvin Gaye and Tricky -- became homogenized in a live setting. Dynamic this wasn't, but t