5 out of 5

Label: Joyful Noise Recordings

Produced by: ?

While pop-rock duo Ohmme (now Finom) have arguably been working from a similar template since their late 2010s debut, just as any long-standing punk band or singles-delivering popstar can attest: you can do a lot with a singular template. And when you dig in more, you find degrees of nuance.

Macie Stewart’s and Sima Cunningham’s harmonies, indie rock-adjacent sing-song stylings, and appreciation for a dash of distortion – traveling some stream that goes from Go-Gos to Blondie to Liz Phair to St. Vincent – form the template; the years have added layers and polish. From Parts to Fantasize Your Ghost, specifically, the band started to lean towards something a bit moodier and less direct; this single, appearing between those releases, captures a perfect crossroads of surprising volume (comparative rawer and rocking roots) and compositional depth, also happening to cover the B52s on the B-side – which is a perfect choice for something that fits with Ohmme’s style, but gets rejiggered with a bit of their darkness.

The tracks are, in short, perfect pop rock tunes, displaying the different flourishes on the group’s template in equal measure.