Straight-Edge Vegan Hardcore at Roseland; Cool Japanese Porn; George Tabb Presents Unsigned Bands at CBGB; Some Abused Girls Are Hot

"There's more vegan stuff out there all the time," he says of maintaining his diet on the road. "It gets better every year. But when you get to the Midwest, you're still like, 'Oh man,' because it's all steakhouses. And Europe is bad?full of meat and cheese."

Snapcase are coming to New York this Friday, playing at Roseland (239 W. 52nd St., betw. 8th Ave. & B'way, 247-0200) with H2O and Face to Face in support of their latest album, Designs for Automotion. It's an amazing record in that it's held together by Daryl, even though he sings one note on all the songs, and sings it with an on-again off-again lisp. Daryl doesn't speak with the impediment; it's just part of his screaming voice, coming out when he gets real angry, as on the opener "Target": "It feeds our senses/ Unconscious/Fuels our weaknesses/Target." Yeah. I bet you never heard anybody rock a lisp before. Snapcase started in Buffalo in 1992; they have been through a really humorous number of lineup changes and temporary breakups since. In the beginning, they played with the pre-cheeze Goo Goo Dolls and Cannibal Corpse.

"Back then," Daryl says, "The Goo Goo Dolls' big song was?I don't know why nobody remembers this?'Don't Beat My Ass with a Baseball Bat.' We opened for them twice. And the Goo Goo Dolls tried to hang out with the guys from Cannibal Corpse, because metal was real cool, you know?"

Snapcase found support in the Buffalo scene and worked their way into national tours; now they get pegged as influences by double-platinum running jokes Papa Roach. And they stayed straight-edge the whole way.

"We never had X's on our shirts or anything. But straight-edge helps you guide yourself. It has never been difficult for me," Daryl says.

Any problems touring with sex-and-drug-type acts?

"No. Usually we just joke around about it with the other bands. We toured with the Deftones, and at the end of it they, uh, put fish heads in our dressing room."

Rock on. The Deftones aren't straight-edge.

...If you aren't into hardcore, you're probably into perverse Japanese movies, right? All this month and next, the Japan Society Film Center (333 E. 47th St., betw. 1st & 2nd Aves., 832-1155) is showing "A Serious Yet Enticing Series of Sensual Films by One of Japan's Most Controversial Directors."

Tatsumi Kumashito (recently dead) popularized the genre of "Nikkatsu Romantic Pornography" in 70s Japan. At the time, the Nikkatsu movie studio was losing money to Hollywood offerings and television; it needed something spicy to grab the youth market. Kumashito delivered with Wet Lips (1972), and soon his softcore flicks were so popular that the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Dept. was on his ass for obscenity.

This Friday at 6:30 is a screening of the hour-and-40-minute thriller Love Bites Back. Similar to Fatal Attraction, it's got sexual content, but not that much; for the real goods you can check Twisted Path of Love (2/16) and The World of Geisha (3/23). I'm going to see The Woman with Red Hair on 3/21: "Set almost entirely inside one room, a female drifter is picked up by a construction worker and they become consumed by their erotic pursuits." Tickets $9.

...For the next four days, Loser's Lounge is at the Westbeth Theater (151 Bank St., betw. West & Washington Sts., 741-0391), doing a tribute to Roxy Music. If you're older (between 20 and 40) and you want to hang with other older people who dig the band that spawned art rock, glam rock and new wave, you should show up. The crowd will be lots of general-interest music people, some serious fans of Roxy Music, and some serious fans of Loser's Lounge leader Joe McGinty, who's constantly playing around town. This Weds.-Thurs. at 8; Fri.-Sat. at 9. Side note: I heard Brian Eno (originally of Roxy Music; now he's busy removing all the balls from U2 records) got paid $100,000 to make the opening "chime" noise on Windows computers. Just in case you were happy with your own life.

...Unsigned rock bands still suck. That's why even despondent drunks don't bother with CBGB's Monday night "Audition Showcases," where incompetent groups slog through 40-minute sets while their parents videotape. Don Hill's (511 Greenwich St. at Spring St., 334-1390) has it much better with "The Best You've Never Heard Fest II" this Wednesday. Up-and-coming New York bands play mini-sets (three songs each, so if they suck, they suck short) and the whole thing is emceed by New York Press star George Tabb. One of the bands is Daddy, and you owe it to yourself to see Daddy, at least once. Part of Don Hill's ongoing Rock Candy series; 8:30.

...Sure is a pain in the ass to get on the subway and hit those "Most Likely..." teenage domestic abuse ads, isn't it? There you are, thinking the world is a decent place?maybe you just got some Combos?and here's an entire row of "Most Likely to Have Her Skull Caved In" spread out before you. Fresh-faced girls in yearbook photos with grisly blurbs; that's what we need to see more of.

It's an effective public service campaign; it should win awards, and it's clear what it's going for. Teen girls riding the subway are meant to look up and see themselves in the very ordinary faces above them. Then they're supposed to call that hotline number and put Mike/Jared/Enrique in jail.

But more often than not, you see men staring at the pictures: horrified men, mulling over their past actions or their sex in general. They're at their worst when they first see the ads, eyes jumping from "Most Likely to Mistake Her Abuse for Love" to "Most Broken Ribs," sizing up their own failures with women, chins raised at all the girls they failed to save.

My only consolation: "Most Likely to Be Burned with a Cigarette" and "Most Times Told to Shut Up" are really kind of cute.