Labels: Rock Action
Review by: Ian Scanlon
Tim Cedar is a man who knows a thing or two about this being in an indie rock band business, his CV (should he ever produce anything like it, which I doubt), includes stints in theLloveblobs, Action Swingers, Ligament, Penthouse, Quickspace, Supersport, and innumberable one off bands called things like Iron Cat that basically just used to do one show and get banned from venues. Anyway this is the second album from his current incarnation Part Chimp, I’ve seen the chimp play on a number of occasions and their main thing is, well VOLUME. Sure I’ve seen loud bands before, and I’ve seen bands with more speakers or amps onstage than PC, but no one seems as loud. I think it’s just the visceral force they pump out… they’re big chaps as well. I think they would still be loud if you made them play maracas. But what’s the album like… well for one thing it’s pretty high on the old volume. A friend recently remarked that when he plays it he has to keep checking whether there’s dust on his needle. This is particularly true for the intro which seems to have been recorded WAY in the red, and then distorted some more just so you get the point, but what struck me, was that this actually sounds quite different from their first record (Chart Pimp) which basically had loud fast songs, loud slow songs, and loud songs that started slow and got faster. This one actually has some dynamics and even a couple of songs with, almost, clean guitar sounds.. Obviously there are some like “hello bastards” that are like listening to blue cheer while you are stuck in a spin dryer, but other tracks, notably proper first song “war machine” with it’s constant “I was born in a witches cauldron” refrain and “bubbles” that remind me of nothing so much as late 80’s era Sonic Youth. The dischordant clean sounding guitars and tom heavy drums are put to some mighty good use, of course it’s always touch and go that they will just bury everything beneath a sea of total fartsome noise… but these moments of near calm make the “OH YEAH! THAT’S RIGHT, ALL THE WAY TO 11” moments even better. This is a ripping record, and while it’s not going to win any novel thought in indie rock awards it’s definitely not a retread of any past triumph’s, and if you’ve ever thought “hey I like these pavement/ sonic youth bands, but why don’t those pussies turn up louder” then this , is for you.