Chrome - Half Machine Lip Moves (Album Review)

 

Chrome - Half Machine Lip Moves

(1979)


My copy: 2009 reissue by Cleopatra.


Beginning in the mid 70s, Chrome was originally the brainchild of Damon Edge before co-collaborator Helios Creed signed on for the second full-length in ‘77. While Alien Soundtracks solidified Chrome as a serious competitor in the experimental punk movement, it would be the later Half Machine Lip Moves that would push them to the height of their influence. Often credited with birthing industrial-rock, the ‘79 LP is a feverish trip through extraterrestrial tones and harsh, abrasive riffing.

Destructive guitar string manipulation brings us first into the lo-fi punk of “TV As Eyes.” While it’s obvious there’s a Stooges connection here, Chrome dares to push their experimentation far beyond any of Iggy’s weirdest stunts. There are often blurred vocal samples bubbling in deep cauldrons of noise only to bleed away into the next transmission. Psych tinged guitar chugging takes reign on “Zombie Warfare (Can’t Let You Down)” where there appears to be a kraut-rock aspect to the repetitive rhythm section. It’s not long before the track is ripped apart and re-structured into a paranoid set of riffs that dance around metallic percussive clanging, displaying their affinity for mixing in unconventional sounds. The songs love to fracture playfully into multiple movements across short timeframes, making more straightforward songs like “March Of The Chrome Police (A Cold Clamey Bombing)” feel normal despite continued experimentation.

“You’ve Been Duplicated” dives into the sci-fi theme as the vocals reduce to villainous taunts over primitive drumming. The music is drenched in interesting samples, making up for the sometimes lackluster production of the low-end. “Mondo Anthem” starts as a distorted march for the depraved before being sucked into a portal of rotating sounds. Droning dissonant keys hold in the background under a jam on Eastern scales before the song fakes its own death more than once.  The title track embraces the industrial sound fully with more scrap-metal percussion and battered guitar shrieks - it is harsh but not produced to be too brittle on the ears. There are echoes of both goth (in some vocal deliveries) and psychedelic (in the heavy use of flange and wah wah) across much of the back half of the record. “Abstract Nympho” sounds like a tour through bizarro NYC thanks to drowned samples and buzzing keys before the song is spastically reworked multiple times. 

“Turned Around” is a brief tantrum of noise crossed with melodic bass and pulsing wah-guitar before “Zero Time” commits fully to a repetitive mantra. The fun of the experiment begins to fall apart with “Creature Eternal” where goofy monster voices feel forced - the bit-crushed instrumentals are neat at least. “Critical Mass” concludes with smooth bass and acidic guitar, ending on one of the shorter songs. 

Half Machine Lip Moves retroactively became a highly influential record for up-and-coming noise-makers of the 80s and 90s, and its creativity is commendable for its time. The sheer transportative quality held within some of the odd soundscapes is far greater than many other contemporaries (Save Faust and other German visionaries from the early 70s). Mostly Chrome’s legacy is about their fusion of industrial and sneering punk music, though many of their noisy interludes are more captivating than the average listeners give credit for. Listen closely and their vision might beam itself into your human noggin: this is the sound of aliens replicating their favorite bits of early punk - and they’ve outdone most of us.

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