The Veldt would seem to be the poster children for that old adage about not judging a book by its cover.

In an industry where musical acts are neatly placed into stylistic bins of content, this North Carolina-based band has had its share of titles.

Whether being categorized as a "black band" or a "Chapel Hill band," the labels always seem to revolve around ethnicity or location. Yet The Veldt isn't Living Colour and the sounds emanating from its debut album, Afrodisiac, don't remotely resemble anything one would equate with that revered college town.

In fact, guitarist Danny Chavis said the only thing that his band has in common with Chapel Hill regulars such as Superchunk and Polvo is location.

"There is a real closed kind of musical community there," Chavis said. "If you don't sound like they do, they don't want you to be a part of it."

With swirling guitars and murky beats that owe more to the late '80s Manchester sound, The Veldt is far from the indie-rock sounds that has put Chapel Hill on the musical map.

The band is also a family affair, founded in 1986 by Chavis and his twin brother Daniel, who serves as the band's vocalist. The brothers Chavis picked up drummer Marvin Levi in 1988 and bassist Dave Burris in 1991.

The Veldt's sound is a mural of the Chavis brothers' influences. Growing up, Danny Chavis was into the strung-out guitar of Jimi Hendrix, while Daniel Chavis was an avid Prince fan who listened to many of the bands coming out of England at the time, including The Cure and Echo and the Bunnymen.

But there are those individuals who cannot imagine black musicians playing music usually reserved for white men with long hair. Currently on tour with the Cocteau Twins, Daniel Chavis said he believes many people still view black men playing rock music as nothing more than a novelty act.

"They come up and say we're trying to sound like something we're not -- just posing," he said. "But it's just a natural thing that we do. Black people have been playing rock music for years --we started it."

Although Daniel Chavis said he can relate to such bands as Fishbone and Living Colour on a racial level, The Veldt is cut from a different cloth.

"In musical terms, I have no influence from Vernon Reid or Sly Stone," he said. "But I respect their styles very much."

Although the music may follow a different beat, Afrodisiac covers the issues of race that unite black musicians, especially on the wonderful ode to the black woman, "Revolutionary Sister." The album follows on the heels of The Veldt's EP Marigolds, which was released more than two years ago.

Between albums, the band toured with The Jesus and Mary Chain, who remixed the first single off of Afrodisiac, "Soul in a Jar." The album itself was produced by Ray Shulman, best known for his work with The Sundays and The Sugarcubes.

But Daniel Chavis said he believes the craftmanship Shulman put into the album is often what turns those disenchanted parties away -- especially when many crave a rough, unclean sound to their music.

"Our live performance is a bit more rough than the record," he said. "The record has a certain polish that sometimes works against us for those people who are trendy, alternapeople -- but I don't give a frog's-fat-ass about them."

The Veldt has avoided those "alternapeople" and the pressures to change the sound to cater to a larger audience, Danny Chavis said.

"When we first came out, people seemed to really like it, but as soon we had some common sense to play what we like, everyone sort of fell off," he said. "Being the way I am, being the color that I am, I can't really afford to play all that slacker rock."

The Veldt will open for the Connells on March 23 at Player's, 112 W. College Ave. Tickets are $5 in advance and $6 at the door.