The Silver Spring Penguin

Combine The Strokes‘ garage-punk guitar with Trent Reznor’s razor-sharp vocals, and you get The Object Lesson.

The three District dudes — Fox, Ben and Jeffry — turn up the distortion on “Future Tense,” with its racing guitar work and gritty vocals. The band leans towards cheeky in “Luna,” which drones hypnotically like surf music on smack.

The groove mellows into lush Smashing Pumpkins melancholy on “Defender of Disarray” and even more so on “The Expanse.” On both tunes, the lead singer’s deep sound drifts into tranquil narcosis, and the guitar and bass lap like little waves of consciousness. Deep, huh?

Get a hit of The Object Lesson from the band’s MySpace page, then overdose on their sound at The Quarry House (8401 Georgia Ave). The deal goes down Saturday night at 9:00 p.m. There’s no word on a cover charge, but the tater tots on your plate will cost you.