Eight years after their third and supposedly final album, Thriller, south Londoners Part Chimp are back for another whirl around the noise-rock floor.
They are infamous for being one of the loudest bands around – and given that they are signed to Mogwai's label that's no idle boast – and their sound is not dissimilar to the mighty Boris of Japan, most notably on the epically churning closer A Lil' Bit o' Justice, while there are doom-laden echoes of Black Sabbath and Earth on the more wiggy cuts such as opener Namekuji and Bouncer's Dream (a Neighbours reference that shows they haven't lost their penchant for jokey titles).
But IV manages to avoid collapsing under its own portentous weight, with speedfreak workouts such as RoRo, Mapoleon and the grungy The Saturn Supersition (sic) expertly sequenced for a change of pace. A symphony of noise.
