There are reasons Veruca Salt are making noise in the indie-rock world: The Chicago foursome has written a clever lyric or two; Louise Post and Nina Gordon sing with girlish aplomb; and guitarists Post and Gordon, bassist Steven J. Lack and drummer Jim Shapiro have come up with some melodies that lodge themselves in your brain and resonate. On American Thighs, Veruca Salt's debut album, there are...

In the early 1970s, rock historian Lenny Kaye compiled a double album called Nuggets, a collection of 27 great '60s garage-rock hits from bands that never made decent full-length LPs. Twenty-five years later, in this age of the 70-minute CD, three-minute pieces of pop perfection are still welcome. Chicago's Veruca Salt, for instance, gave us "Seether," 3:16 of catchy '90s rage. The album from...