It may be well into its fifties, but the teenage distraction we call popular music is still struggling to be taken seriously.

It was not taken seriously at all until the mid-'60s, when a Times of London critic praised The Beatles' clever use of Aeolian cadence and iambic pentameter in their music. Praise that hardly surprisingly left its recipients rather scratching their moptopped heads.

Aficionados of more 'refined' music continue to look down their noses at pop music. But the dilemma facing ... And You Will Know Us By The Trail of Dead -- a Texas-based rock group whose latest sonic tour-de-force is an exhilarating, operatic assault that employs symphonic percussion, strings, brass and choral chanting (and that's just in the first minute!) -- may be that to pop music fan, this is a band that knows too much.

At the very least, it's safe to say Conrad Keely, Jason Reece and Kevin Allen know an Aeolian cadence when they hear one.

"There is a strong belief system ingrained in rock, and especially in punk music, that to know is to not be able to feel -- to not be spontaneous," vocalist/guitarist/percussionist Keely concedes. "I don't believe that's true, and I am really trying to fight that belief in other people.

"Some of the greatest composers knew music inside and out, and you cannot accuse them of being cold or dispassionate. Mozart is the shining example of that. I think contrary to not allowing you to feel, it actually allows you to appreciate music on a whole new level."

There are several such levels to Worlds Apart, a grandiose work for orchestra and power-trio that inevitably plays out as a latter-day Ziggy Stardust, its roots showing vividly on tracks like the gloriously glam All White. Keely cites as a starting point the work of composers Carl Orff and Basil Poledouris (the former celebrated for Carmina Burana; the latter for the powerful Conan the Barbarian soundtrack). Oh, and Kate Bush.

"We were listening to Hounds of Love for drum sounds," Keely claims. "The biggest focus on this record was the percussion, so the inspiration was coming from really unusual places, like Drumline (the 2002 film that delved into the life of a marching band).

"It was in my head to use polyrhythms, just because it's such a great prog-rock cliche that I wanted to bring back. Like Genesis, or how Andrew Lloyd Webber used them in Jesus Christ Superstar. So I wrote the obligatory song in 7/8. That was fun."

We see. And please tell us, if you could be any sort of tree ...

"You know," Keely observes, "classical music when it came out was very pop, and something that rocked too. Certainly, one day someone's going to look back at what we're doing as classical music."

Yet for all its classical tendencies the band demonstrates on tracks such as The Rest Will Follow -- a radio-friendly song whose intro mischievously echoes Derek and the Dominos' Little Wing only to accelerate into an infectious track that is equal parts pop-crooning and punk-aggression -- that Trail of Dead can rock with the best of 'em.

And if they're hosting a modern-classics party, Worlds Apart's acidic title track makes it clear not everyone is invited. "This and that scene/They sound all the same to me," Keely sneers in a diatribe that ultimately ties the state of contemporary music to the pending death of the American Dream.

Strong words, for a pop group.

"I don't see any contradiction in criticizing the game and playing it at the same time," Keely asserts.

"It appears to be a contradiction in other people's minds. I don't really understand why. To me, that would be tantamount to telling Gandhi he shouldn't criticize politics if he's a politician.

"I'm not criticizing the game, I'm just putting down other teams. For fun."

It's a dangerous move that demands the accuser put up or shut up. So far, Keely says, no one who has heard Worlds Apart has asked him to shut up.

"The feedback in general has been quite positive," he proudly reports. "And I had very low expectations, because when we finished the record I was thinking, 'Wow, I don't know if anybody is going to get this.'

"It's nice to hear people that were into us before and people that didn't know about us before telling us how much they like it. Nice, because it was the hardest single project I've ever worked on."

Perhaps it could have been easier, had the band not known so much.