The Silver Spring Penguin

Tired of scraping ice from your windshield? Crank up Lazlo Lee and the Motherless Children, and watch the frost shatter off your car.

The Baltimore trio — guitarist Lazlo Lee, bassist Rebecca Lawrence and drummer Dan Steele — rev up their bluesy rock old-skool style. Think MC5 — loud, raw and dirrrrrty.

In “Messin’ “, the band goes for straight-up blues with a heavy rock beat along the lines of early Led Zepplin (or recent Wolfmother). “Don’t Play With the Dead” hits with delirious slide-guitar licks, but its quick beat makes a good transition to the band’s garage-punk sound.

The driving riff that introduces “Hey Doctor” hints of Steppenwolf’s “Born to Be Wild”, but Lee’s bone-shattering screams push the song into punk territory. And the demo cut “Let Me Bleed” starts as an homage to AC/DC, then devolves into old-fashioned bar-brawling mayhem.

Toughen yourself up with samples from the band’s MySpace page, then catch them live next Thursday, Feb 28, at The Quarry House (8401 Georgia Ave). Lazlo Lee and the Motherless Children appear that evening with Brooklyn LES punks Clean Teens.

Photos courtesy of Lazlo Lee and the Motherless Children.