When
Damon Edge and
Helios Creed parted ways in 1984,
Edge decided to keep Chrome, the band he and
Creed had led for nearly a decade, alive and recast their sound to synth-heavy psychedelia. Additionally, he decided to release albums under his own name.
Alliance, his first solo album, is fascinating in the context of underground punk and alternative -- no one else was making music as atmospheric and experimental as
Edge, except maybe
Creed himself -- but it doesn't break any new ground for
Edge. For the most part, it sounds identical to the Chrome albums
Edge made after splitting with
Creed, including a pair of extended epics that the
Creed-era Chrome would never have dared. That's not to say it's an unlistenable record by any means -- "I'm a Gentleman" is as chilling and brutal as anything Chrome ever did, while the beautiful piano piece "Rhapsody in Maroon" is far outside Chrome's established range -- but by using the exact same musicians who play on Chrome's post-
Creed albums and writing all of the music himself (as he does with Chrome),
Edge repeated the same pattern he used when making Chrome albums. Ultimately, as good as
Alliance can be, it still seems odd that
Edge would choose to release it as a solo album when for all intents and purposes it's really a Chrome album, albeit an impressive one. ~ Victor W. Valdivia