You could easily substantiate that 1992 was a banner year for the original wave of noise rock: The Jesus Lizard’s Liar, Babes in Toyland’s Fontanelle, the Melvins’ Lysol, Helmet’s Meantime, the Cows’ Cunning Stunts, the Pain Teens’ Stimulation Festival, Tar’s Toast, and Today Is the Day’s Supernova all appeared within the same 12 month timeframe. So did the debut recordings by Austin, Tex., trio Cherubs, "Pink Party Desert" 7” and full-length bruiser Icing, but these titles (released in quick succession by Trance Syndicate Records) didn’t yet measure up to the type of (sub-genre) transcendent fare—but that was about to change.
In mid-1994, guitarist Kevin Whitley (formerly of Ed Hall), bassist Owen McMahon, and drummer Brent Pager found themselves in a pre-show fist fight that would break up the band. Trance Syndicate was preparing to issue the sophomore effort, Heroin Man, an album merely hinted at by the connective tissue of 7”s released since the debut, but one that would deservedly seed a cult of fans and become a cross-genre inspiration for the next two decades of heavy music.
A band breaking up as, say, its records are about to ship back from the pressing plant, has become the Conrad Bain of an independent label’s existence. Trance Syndicate was founded in 1990 by Butthole Surfers drummer King Coffey as follow-through for a New Year’s resolution. The label would launch or oversee the discographies of Bedhead, Sixteen Deluxe, American Analog Set, Windsor for the Derby, as well as …And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead. But its first few years of shepherding the sounds of the Cherubs, Crust, johnboy, Pain Teens, Ed Hall, Crunt, and Distorted Pony into the world made Trance the Texan answer to Amphetamine Reptile—the veritable home base of the American noise scene.
Titled Heroin Man, Cherubs' second album featured a dead man face-down floating in a dirty bathtub. It was downright ridiculous, and even within the transgressive realm of noise, bordered on tasteless—the previous few years had seen a spate of drug deaths in the community. The album and its themes were the Cherubs’ act of mourning the overdose death of their close friend, Dave DeLuna. Instead of McMahon’s gruff Aggro 101 bark-bark vocals that had dominated Icing, this album had Whitley handling vocals. This was a key factor in Heroin Man’s superiority over not just the first album, but 95% of the bloating genre of caustic, guitar-drive noise rock. With this album the Cherubs had perfected something that broke free of the boundaries firmly set in place by the band’s chosen mini-movement: the noisiest pop music on the planet.
Opener "Stag Party" is one of two tracks built atop a sample of an irritating noise (the now arcane sound of a busy signal), but the first thing that hits the listener over the head is the overwhelming mountain of bulldozing sonic nastiness this band somehow conjured out of its instruments. Heroin Man was exponentially more dense and intense than the majority of what came out of the original noise rock era. It’s hotter-than-hot mix was a middle finger to the redline; it was "lo-fi" but mountainous at the same time. The hooks carry Heroin Man through its 50 minutes of chaos, a stone cold classic that would take on a life of its own as the Cherubs dissolved. Two years post facto, Trance released the Short of Popular collection; a 49-minute odds and ends CD made up of songs tossed from the Heroin Man sessions and cherry-picked brilliance across the 7” and compilation formats. It was like a Singles Going Steady of noise rock—and was as crucial to the Cherubs' legacy as the proper album that preceded it.
Like many other somewhat definable subsections of the '86–'96 underground rock zeitgeist, noise rock has seen the word "revival" slapped onto it at five different intervals in the last decade. So it is 10 years into this "revival" that the original Cherubs lineup reform (last summer), and belying the early message board rumors about a reissue campaign, announced their plans to start recording a proper third album. Maybe they felt the need to record a follow up to an album that was now commanding $200-$300 on vinyl.
You can’t call the Cherubs' comeback "long awaited" because no one saw it coming. 2 Ynfynyty was released on March 3rd (and the vinyl followed last week) by heavy music fighters-of-the-good-fight, Brutal Panda Records. They didn’t make an album that could have come right after Heroin Man, nor does it sound like the last 20 years never happened—though that’s passing as the common review sentiment. This is a work of modern day noise rock minus the revivalist baggage. 2 Ynfynyty feels like the last 20 years did happen and the Cherubs were paying close attention—though whether they were or not is easily debatable. If by some weird turn of events it was revealed that the band secretly recorded and shelved 10 albums between 1995 and 2013, 2 Ynfynyty would make more sense. Few '90s band reunions in the last decade-plus ever seemed to be about anything but cashing in and cashing out, but the Cherubs have returned with an album that shows why they were so worthy of our attentions in the first place.