Beat L.A. captures the spirit of multiple generations of Los Angeles underground rockers, back when indie still meant unknown, overlooked, loud, angry, and awesome. Not content to stick to a specific decade or style, Beat L.A. edges on all the minimalist hard rock genres, from ’60s-styled garage rock to punk, new wave to no wave noise. But here’s the catch: The entire album is composed of cover versions by today’s L.A. indie scene.

It’s a bold experiment, linking the present-day indie sound to the indie worlds of 20, 30, and 40 years ago. Almost none of the bands chose to stick to the original’s musical zeitgeist, instead offering a fresh, updated, modern take. Crystal Antlers is one of the exceptions to this rule, unfortunately abandoning their full, lush electric sound for a stripped-down, punky take on Black Randy & Metrosquad’s “I Slept in an Arcade”. More successful in this vein is the powerful punk one-two punch of No Age and Geisha Girls, covering Urinals and 45 Grave.

As is typical with cover compilations, the best stuff sounds the least like the original band while still retaining something of their aura. On “Scratch Out the Sky”, Bobb Bruno provides all the noise of the Distorted Pony original without all the hardcore, replaced with the current drone noise trend. RATS turn X’s “The Unheard Music” into a slow, jazzy instrumental ballad, with just enough punk rock bass to pick it out of a lineup. Anglos turns Dream Syndicate’s “Days of Wine and Roses” into a brilliantly demented pastiche of mandolin and house music, un-ironically transforming the post-punk classic into a neo-disco rager.

Sure there are Black Flag and NOFX and the Chili Peppers, but this charity collection (proceeds go to Doctors Without Borders) proves the vitality of those locals-only L.A. underground punk bands.

Essential Tracks: “Days of Wine and Roses”, “The Unheard Music”, “Anymore”, “Scratch Out the Sky”, “Lie Beg Borrow and Steal”