Darren Mcnamee

Xtra Large's just-released debut album, "Now I Eat Them," offers two pleasant surprises. One is the music itself, in which the young Orange County band breaks through alternative/hard-rock conventions with a striking display of confidence, skill and imagination. The other surprise is that Xtra Large's two main songwriters and onstage agitators, singer Darren McNamee and guitarist Warren Fitzgerald, both have managed to stay in one piece long enough to make an album, period.

Xtra Large's just-released debut album, "Now I Eat Them," offers two pleasant surprises. One is the music itself, in which the young Orange County band breaks through alternative/hard-rock conventions with a striking display of confidence, skill and imagination. The other surprise is that Xtra Large's two main songwriters and onstage agitators, singer Darren McNamee and guitarist Warren Fitzgerald, both have managed to stay in one piece long enough to make an album, period.

E clecticism is the keyword among the top 1992 freshmen of Southern California, where rap and retro, grunge and industrial, escapism and confrontation all coexist in a happily active melting pot. Here's a look at the 11 new area acts who have made the biggest splash this year: Xtra Large: With two comically maniacal frontmen in singer Darren McNamee and guitarist Warren Fitzgerald, Xtra Large is prone to shoot off crazily onstage.

Gherkin Raucous will play a reunion show tonight at Crawford's in Lakewood, then the band's three remaining original members will jet to London to "hang out" with Rat Scabies, former leader of the early British punk band, the Damned. "We might do some recording there. It depends on how things go," said Gherkin's guitarist, Warren Fitzgerald, who also plays in the Vandals. "We're going there basically on a vacation, but something might come of it."

Josh Freese, drummer for the local band Xtra Large, plays on Paul Westerberg's new album and has been drafted into the former Replacement's touring band. Freese "left for Minneapolis this morning, and he's going out with them for eight weeks," Xtra Large guitarist Warren Fitzgerald said Wednesday. Plans call for the Orange County band to start work on its second album for Giant Records when Freese returns from the road.

Promoter David J. Gaar of Westminster is changing the location of the Cajun-zydeco dance parties he has been throwing on the third Saturday of each month. Starting with a Bad Boys Zydeco Band gig March 21, the place will change from the Sunset Beach Club in Orange to the Meadowlark Cafe, 6197 Ball Road, Cypress. Coming attractions include the Joe Simien Cajun Band, April 18; John Delafose & the Eunice Playboys, May 17, and the Cheryl Cormier Cajun Band, June 20.

Gherkin Raucous, a local, satiric rock band, has extricated itself from the pickle it got itself into with management of the Coach House. The county's leading concert club, the Coach House, had banned the popular rockers from further performances because of the obscene and critical comments that the band had made about the club on stage during a Nov. 25 show.

Xtra Large, something of an all-star group of Orange County alternative-hard rock musicians, has struck a deal with Giant Records and is scheduled to release its debut album by summer's end. The band, which played its first show only two months ago, consists of players who have had high profiles on the local scene as members of various groups. Singer Darren McNamee and guitarist Warren Fitzgerald both were in the frenetic metal-funk-comedy band, Gherkin Raucous.

After two years as one of the most popular draws on the Orange County original rock scene, Gherkin Raucous is playing its farewell show Friday night at Foul Play in Huntington Beach. Drummer Miles Gillett's decision to return to his native New Zealand next month is the immediate cause of the breakup, although the other members said that musical differences and the band's inability to land a recording deal played a role in Gillett's departure and in their own decision not to continue.

* 1/2, Sugar Ray, "Lemonade and Brownies" Atlantic The last O.C. local to borrow as brazenly and witlessly as Sugar Ray was former treasurer Robert L. Citron, and that left the whole county bankrupt. These Huntington Beach-based exponents of boneheaded neo-frat rock may be bankrupt of ideas and good taste, but their ear for the ripped-off musical hook and their sharp way of pounding home variations on well-tested rap-metal formulas could earn them a bundle.

It's a time of ferment on the Orange County club scene, as promoters seek to launch new venues for original music. Johnnie Liddi, an Orange-based independent promoter, says he will try to establish the Kono Hawaii, a 600-capacity nightclub in Santa Ana, as a home for a variety of pop styles. The 26-year-old promoter says he will start Feb. 9 with a bill of local alternative rockers: the Swamp Zombies, A Sight Unseen and the Ziggins.