Blood on the Moon [PA]

Performer: Chrome
Producer: Damon Edge; Helios Creed; Damon Edge; Helios Creed
Distributor: E1 Distribution (USA)

Notes: Chrome: Helios Creed (vocals, guitar); Damon Edge (vocals, Moog synthesizer); Hillary Stench (bass instrument); John Stench (drums). Audio Mixer: Damon Edge. Recording information: Bologne. With the Stench brothers on board as the rhythm section, Chrome veered towards creating more 'regular' rock music, if only conceptually. While still never playing live, it's easy to imagine many of the songs on Blood kicking out the jams live, especially since in the punk/new wave-crazy scenes of the times they would have cut a truly unique path. No matter how near to three-chord catchiness some of the numbers get, something about them always sounds just off enough. Edge maintains his usual mix of electronic weirdness -- at this point he had the knack for never making his keyboards sound cheap or or cheesy, a good talent -- whileCreed is all over the place as usual, his seemingly effortless but always fantastic soloing ripping through the songs. "Perfumed Metal" is one fantastic example of many, with both his strong rhythm crunch and his freeform work turning everything into one powercharged feedback frenzy. Another winner is the massive solo halfway through "The Strangers" -- only a few seconds long, but better than most songs in their entirety. Meanwhile, Edge feeds his voice through effects processors and keeps on the strange lyrical path -- thus, from "Inner Vacume," this couplet: "Buildings built like beaches/Dripping off the land." It's not all aliens from Mars or anything -- often it seems to just be about the strange people down the street or a bad dream -- but Chrome do have a way of making it all sound like something not quite of this planet, musically and lyrically. The Stench duo do a more than fine job for their part, keeping everything almost danceable on their end on a number of songs, otherwise creating staccato, jerky rhythms and deep space when needed. Wrapping up with the nicely fried instrumental title track, Blood is another proper Chrome keeper. ~ Ned Raggett

Reimagining the cosmic angle of Hawkwind and the harsh psychedelia of Silver Apples for an urban dystopia, San Francisco's Chrome represented the extreme experimental wing of early punk and were instrumental in the creation of industrial music. The band underwent many line-up changes in their lifespan, but either founder Damon Edge or guitarist Helios Creed--recruited after their 1976 debut--or both were constants. Over the course of their late '70s albums, the band's sound morphed from noise-based, heavily affected guitar psych to a more synthesizer- and programming-driven approach. Damon Edge recorded many solo albums under the Chrome moniker in the mid '80s and early '90s, while Helios Creed retook the reins when Edge died from heart failure in 1995.

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