Music Reviews

“chrome_locust”

Chrome Locust

Chrome Locust

Tee Pee/MIA

All I can say is… So far it’s a great year for heavy music. Heavy, fuzzy, and psychedelic. Chrome Locust, the brainchild of Todd Youth and Michael Wildwood, that is, a combination of Murphy’s Law and D-Generation, seems to be about putting a dark and psychedelic spin to the “stoner rock” phenomenon that I sure hope grips the nation this summer. Of course the recipe is pretty simple: take two parts Black Sabbath, a spoonful of MC5, and plenty of leftover punk angst, shake hard, and that’s Chrome Locust.

Their songs appear to be about tuning out of this insane world, with its bombs, greed, and poorly-aimed hate. “Drop,” fitting this mold, is a dark tune about a best friend – a best friend who just happens to be inside the mind of a human powder keg about to burst… Sort of a more maleficent “Whiskey Man.” “New World Disorder,” with the line “Just remember you’re never alone,” is along the same line, only the demons aren’t inside your head, they’re really out there… “The Cycle of Birth and Death” is, well, it’s mostly a dark, heavy, hypnotic instrumental that I guess builds on the whole theme of futility and life…

Now dig this line from “Teen Dream”: “…what happened to that girl I knew/ ripped up jeans and powder blue/ PLAY ASTEROIDS TO PARANOID…” That’s paying tribute to the lonely video game outlaws of days past, and to the music we, er, “they” had going through our heads as the destruction of computer-generate rocks took our minds off just how pathetic things were.

But, I don’t want to give the impression that one should be depressed at all, quite the contrary! The album does, in fact, quake!

MIA Records, P.O. Box 1236, Canal Street Station, New York, NY 10013


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