Mechanical bull of your mind

Have you seen that Kia Sorento car commercial with the life-sized sock monkey? The one where some guy sings “How ya like me now?” while the monkey and its puppet pals go to Vegas and ride mechanical bulls? Well, the song is by a United Kingdom band called the Heavy that’s signed to Counter Records, a sublabel of venerated imprint Ninja Tune. Hailing from the small Southern town of Noid, Bath, the quartet mashes out ’60s-styled garage rock, and its latest, 2009’s The House That Dirt Built, is made of sterner stuff than the aforementioned kiddie rave-up. On “Sixteen,” it uses a riff from Screamin’ Jay Hawkins’ “I Put a Spell on You” to bemoan a young girl possessed by the devil: “He’s gonna stretch her out like tape in a cassette.” Nasty! The Heavy has plenty of garage-rock jams like that, so you can ride the mechanical bull of your mind. The Heavy plays this Friday, November 5, 9 p.m. at Blue Lamp, 1400 Alhambra Boulevard; www.bluelamp.com; call for cover.