3 out of 5

Label: Rock Action Records

Produced by: John Cummings (recorded by)

We are all agreed: Part Chimp are defined by being loud. Lots of bands do this; Part Chimp somehow – decades on, various claimants of “loudest band of all time” having come and gone – still manage to be one of the outright noisiest acts I’ve heard. It lasted past their debut; it’s true regardless of which album you’re checking out.

Two things (I think) make this work: it goes beyond shtick as Part Chimp releases are generally catchy as heck, meaning the songwriting is there; and it would seem to be somehow baked into the band’s DNA, since it’s an approach that’s held true regardless of producer or studio.

But the approach “working” has degrees, of course. I Am Come, the group’s second disc, is… kinda perfect at first blush: kicking off with a clatter of unsortable noise that congeals into the raw, catchy riffing and singalong chorusing of War Machine; the way the album sifts through multiple quiet-to-loud anthems and punk flourishes before releasing penultimate epic 30,000,000,000,000,000 People; then bookending with another (extended) splash of noise – the album absolutely is structured to nail the balance of volume overload with head-bobbing melodies, memorable shouts, and a runtime that’s just long enough to make its mark. This doesn’t necessarily stop working, but after a few spins, it becomes more apparent how repetitive the songwriting is from a topdown level, going from a couple rounds of clean chords to sudden and explosive distortion, and a chanted few lines that, though the words are somewhat buried in the mix, are recognizable enough to land as part of the overall earworm. It’s hellishly effective and, as mentioned, very loud – and satisfyingly so – in a way that I think kind of tricks a listener like me into hearing more to this than there is.

This is also doubly apparent, though, with the benefit of hindsight: I’m listening to this with later Part Chimp albums having been delivered, and the leaps ahead in songwriting are stunning. So it’s almost like this actually was shtick in comparison to what was to come: the songwriting chops were there, for sure, but the band could rely on their volume – and the silly, offhand persona that produces childlike album art and whatever the album title means – to get by. I dig this disc, but it’s ephemeral; it no longer lands as hard as it once did, despite still rocking very, very much.