Night Watch / Tom Scanlon

What happens when you mix the raw anger of punk rock with the existential excavations of literature? Arlie Carstens happens. Juno happens.

Juno is the band, arguably Seattle's best - though fans of Death Cab for Cutie, Sunny Day Real Estate and 764-HERO could certainly debate it.

Carstens, one of Juno's three guitarists, is the singer and lyricist, charismatic and cryptic.

Over Thai food in Belltown, Carstens grows as excited talking about his literary heroes (Bukowski, Fante, Bulgakov) as he does mentioning his musical influences (Mogwai, Lungfish, Fugazi).

For five years, Juno has been electrifying Seattle club crowds with complex, melancholic songs that explode into a controlled, guitar catharsis and Carstens' anguished singing. Now, nearly two years after a full-length debut ("This Is the Way It Goes and Goes and Goes") that received glowing reviews, Juno has finally brought forth its second album, "A Future Lived in Past Tense."

Released a few weeks ago by Washington, D.C.'s, DeSoto Records, the new Juno album is extending the band's reputation around the country.

A CMJ New Music Monthly reviewer called the new Juno album "stunning" ("equal parts of Jawbox's angular shifts, Mogwai's atmosphere, Red House Painters' droning and Tristeza's melodies").

Wanda Atkinson, general manager of the fine indie-rock Internet station 3WK (www.3wk.com), says "A Future Lived in Past Tense" is one of her favorite records of the year. She reviewed it as an "incredible wall-of-sound album that settles once and for all any rumors that Seattle music began and ended with grunge. Sucks you in from the first song and takes you on a rip-roaring excursion into just how much noise and pure enjoyment you can get from three guitars and a drum set."

While the sonic eruptions are pure Juno, the band also takes some bold steps on its new album. Notably, Carstens does a Jim Morrison with a spoken-word piece called "Things Gone and Things Still Here (We'll Need the Machine-Guns By Next March)."

Clearly, this is not a band with commercial radio/MTV aspirations: "A Future Lived in Past Tense" is filled with songs - some instrumental, by the way - that blast along for more than 10 minutes.

The writing blends with the guitars to create a foggy marsh, then lines shoot out like morose flares: "I feel like I'm in a dream caught under some invisible force smothering me" ... "your son's hands stayed warm long after he died" ... "a ghost passing from your throat each time you scream" ... "Bulgakov to Woland's crowd" ... "we use each other like axes to cut down the ones we really love" "you washed your blood off the walls"

Though tears well in his eyes as he discusses a few of his songs, Carstens insists that he is, overall, a very happy person. And he is excited and optimistic about his musical career, now that Juno has completed its first European tour and is about to begin a national tour with its new album.

Juno plays the Crocodile Cafe tonight (9:30 p.m., $7). Kinski, another highly evolved rock band that creates sonic symphonies, is also on the bill.

What a great double-bill: The wise, adventurous David Byrne and acclaimed singer-songwriter Joe Henry are at the Crocodile on Monday. Alas, the show has been sold out for weeks.

Tickets are still available for Kristin Hersh's two shows at the Croc. She continues her post-Throwing Muses solo career on Wednesday and Thursday (9 p.m., $15).

Johnny Dowd - picture a preacher on hallucinogens - will talk-sing about dark and strange subjects at the Tractor Tavern on Saturday and Sunday (9 p.m., $10). Seattle's Suicide Jack opens for Dowd on Sunday.

Tom Scanlon can be reached at 206-464-3891 or tscanlon@seattletimes.com.