After meeting at an
Oh Sees
show in London,
John Dwyer
and pedigreed punk/new wave drummer
David Barbarossa
began working on new music together that would eventually become their new project
Chime Oblivion
.
Barbarossa
's work as the original drummer for
Bow Wow Wow
and
Adam and the Ants
helped set the course for what punk evolved into, and the material the two musicians came up with for their self-titled debut album leans heavily into the influence of early punk at its most uninhibited. The songs are generally fast, tightly wound, and dissonant affairs, heavy on fuzzy guitars and anxious rhythms. "The Fiend" is a start-stop dance between
's unrelenting drumming and singer
H.L. Nelly
's strangled vocal eruptions, and the quasi-disco groove and no wave saxophone blurts of "Heated Horses" take cues from the mutated dance music of
Essential Logic
or
the Contortions
includes noise scene mainstay
Weasel Walter
on guitar, adding to the no wave component, and
Dwyer
's inclusion of blitzed synthesizer sounds brings to mind synth punk reference points like
the Units
Screamers
. There are also more straightforward songs, and the moody rocker "Kiss Her or Be Her" is a dead ringer for
the Slits
while the riffy explosion of "Neighborhood Dog" recalls
X-Ray Spex
's debut doesn't break much new ground, but it does offer a set of exciting, fun songs that serve as a reminder of how visceral punk can be. ~ Fred Thomas