Kevin Bronson on September 26th, 2023

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* This post is not about beloved L.A. power-pop band Rocket, who formed in the Spaceland parking lot and went on to appear on Fox TV’s “The Next American Rock Band.” Nor is it about Rocket, the pop-punk quintet who have played around L.A. since 2015 or so after wracking their brains and failing to come up with an original name. Nor is it about any of the rockets Elon Musk has launched, any that came From the Tombs or the Crypt or any that came after Love. Naming your band shouldn’t be Rocket Science (that’s taken, too), but …

Young L.A. quartet Rocket formed during the throes of the pandemic, but the kinship between its members go all the way back to high school and before. Their love of 1990s grunge and alt-rock blossomed when the band — singer-bassist Alithea Tuttle, drummer Cooper Ladomade and guitarists Baron Rinzler and Desi Scaglione — found themselves jamming in an 8-by-11-foot practice space in 2021, fleshing out demos written by Tuttle and Scaglione.

The foursome’s debut EP, “Versions of You,” is out Oct. 27, and anybody who fondly revisits their faded 1990s mix cassettes will want to check it out. There’s the shoegaze grandeur of “Sugarcoated,” the jagged, riffy “On Your Heels” and, released today, “Portrait Show,” which verges on Dinosaur Jr. homage but doesn’t cross the line.

The latest single, Tuttle says, “focuses on different versions of myself, while songs like ‘Normal to Me’ and ‘On Your Heels’ have more of an emphasis on the different versions of people that they show you.”

Various sounds of the ’90s have experienced quite a renaissance in recent years; Rocket seem one group of latecomers who are doing them big and bold and right.

||| Stream: “Portrait Show,” “On Your Heels” and “Sugarcoated”

||| Live: Rocket opens for Milly on Nov. 8 at the Lodge Room (tickets). Rocket also opens for Julie two nights at the Constellation Room, Dec. 1 (tickets) and Dec. 2 (tickets).