Oneida's sprawling 2018 album
Romance was the group's return to song-based rock music after several experimental releases, including a collaboration with post-minimalist composer
Rhys Chatham. Recalling their remarkable run of LPs during the 2000s,
Romance was a restless collage of gritty electronics, Krautrock repetition, and tricky, sporadic drumming. 2022 follow-up
Success retains some of those elements, but it's a far more stripped-down set of garage punk tunes, owing more to
the Velvet Underground than
Silver Apples or
Can. Opener "Beat Me to the Punch" starts with sunny guitar chords and a brisk, driving beat, yet the lyrics about blood drying on the floor are decidedly bleak and violent. Then an absolutely destructive noisy guitar solo takes over, while the deceptively sunny beat continues onward. Two of the album's most immediate songs similarly fuse upbeat music with sinister lyrics -- "I Wanna Hold Your Electric Hand" promises not to draw blood, while "Rotten" looks back on a relationship that soured, though ultimately it breathes a sigh of relief ("I've never felt better in my life"). Apart from these shorter noise pop songs, there's a few longer excursions, all of which keep up the punk energy, but take the opportunity to stretch out across the horizon. "Low Tide" is a high-speed motorik spree that eventually gets clouded in dubby effects near the end of its nine-minute running time. The instrumental "Paralyzed" is two minutes longer, and its vibrating keyboard sequence laps up against the guitar currents, bending time so that the track seems half its length. Even at its most expansive,
Success never feels indulgent, and its directness makes it one of the band's most exhilarating records. ~ Paul Simpson