LOS ANGELES — The Screaming Trees regrouped onstage for the first time in more than a year Thursday night, debuting two songs that fused psychedelia with hard-edged roots-rock.

"Ash Gray Sunday" was an all-out rocker with a ferocious groove and driving guitar lines, while "Revelator" started slower, then flared in the chorus. Both songs made a snug fit with the band's grungey, older material.

The new numbers are indicative of the "good ol' rock" course the Screaming Trees are charting for their follow-up to 1996's Dust, according to bassist Van Conner.

"The last record, we had a lot of arrangements and a lot of ... keyboards and overdubs," he said. "We were talking about making [the next one] more ... of a hard-rock type album. We'll see. You never know, it might turn out totally different."

Thursday's showcase was the first of the band's two consecutive gigs at the Viper Room, scheduled to help the pioneering Seattle power-rock group land a record deal.

Career-Spanning Set

The Trees — Conner; his guitarist brother, Gary Lee Conner; singer Mark Lanegan; and drummer Barrett Martin — were joined by guitarist Josh Homme of Queens of the Stone Age. Homme, who has toured with the band in the past, also participated in recent recording sessions for a four-song demo, which they shopped to record labels.

The show featured selections from throughout the band's career, including such Dust cuts as "Sworn and Broken" and "Halo of Ashes" (RealAudio excerpt). The Trees played the novelty song "No One Knows" — which they had never before played live — off 1992's Sweet Oblivion and another tune they haven't played in 10 years, "Cold Rain" (from 1987's Even If and Especially When), to appease members of their unofficial fan club, who had flown in from as far away as New York.

"We don't want to keep playing the same damn songs," Van Conner said before the show.

While the Conner brothers played with fervor — with Gary Lee throwing in some windmill motions as he thrashed around on his guitar — Lanegan was focused, as usual. He rarely spoke to the crowd between songs and closed his eyes or looked down as he sang, one hand gripping the microphone and the other clutching the mic stand.

Among the other musicians in the crowd were members of Stone Temple Pilots and Smash Mouth, and Hole guitarist Eric Erlandson, who said, "Mark has an amazing voice and is a great man. Someday I wish I could be as great a man as him."

Back In Action

The Screaming Trees last played live during their short West Coast tour in fall 1998. The members since have pursued other projects, with Lanegan releasing his fourth solo album, I'll Take Care of You (1999), and Van Conner producing albums for Seattle bands Gardener and Kitty Kitty, as well as working as a contractor for Microsoft.

They've worked on songs "here and there," Van Conner said, but he noted it wasn't always easy, because the bandmembers live in different parts of thecountry. Van Conner lives in Seattle, Gary Lee Conner lives in New York and Lanegan lives in Los Angeles. Martin, who has worked with R.E.M. and plays in R.E.M. guitarist Peter Buck's side band, Tuatara, divides his time between L.A. and Seattle.

Since forming in 1983, the Trees have split at several points in their career, with the blame falling on their notorious drinking and fighting. But the last year has simply been a hiatus, according to the Conner brothers.

"We never broke up," Gary Lee Conner said.

"Yeah, we never officially said, 'We're not doing this anymore,' " Van Conner said. "We were all just doing our own stuff."

Van Connor said an e-mail from Brian Klein, a manager at Steve Stewart Management (Stone Temple Pilots), kicked them back into gear. Klein expressed interest in working with the Trees.

"I think we were all kind of waiting for someone to call us and say, 'Hey, you wanna do a record?,' " the bassist said. "We haven't had a manager for a couple years, and without a manager ... none of us want to do it. ... I'd rather just not be a band anymore than be involved in the business side of music."