Album Review: The Cheifs – “Holly-West Crisis”

Time to pile into the DeLorean, fire up the flux capacitor and take a trip back to the early 1980s for this one, boys and girls. The political and cultural climate in Southern California at that time proved to be a fertile breeding ground for post-Second Wave punk rock action and spawned immense expansion in an ever-growing number of scenes: skate punk, surf punk, the early days of what we now call hardcore, etc. Some of the bands from that time blew up (Black Flag, X, Bad Religion, Social Distortion), while some were quick-hitters (The Stains, Germs). Some, like The Cheifs, served as only a blip on the proverbial radar screen, though the music they left behind proved timeless.

The Cheifs “Holly-West Crisis” is a collection of all of the material that the band put on wax during their brief tenure (roughly 1980 to 1983), and was recently released by Dr. Strange Records. While name may be obscure (and yes, it really is spelled “Cheifs”) to all but the most rabid fan of early-80s punk music, The Cheifs’ sound is instantly recognizable and sounds almost familiar. Though their rhythm section changed at least once during their brief history, the earnest snarling vocals of Jerry Koskie (more recently of The Simpletones) and the buzzsaw guitar stylings of George Walker remained constant and comprise the strengths of this record. A sound that echoes some of their contemporaries: think Dead Boys, Heartbreakers, early Black Flag/Bad Religion and/or “White Riot”-style Clash.

Sonically, “Holly-West Crisis” is all you’d expect from an early 1980s punk album: gritty, lo-fi, raw and always up tempo with style influences that range from pre-pop-punk (the uber-catchy “Blues” and “Eddie’s Revenge”) to pre-hardcore (“Holly-West Crisis”, “Cheifin’”) to thrashy, minor chord heavy, metal inspired tunes like “Scrapped” and “Tower 13.” Lyrically, The Cheifs cover mostly social illnesses (like any good punk band); guns, drugs, poverty, class warfare all make appearances. Occasionally, however, the tone turns unexpectedly optimistic; “Scrapped” is almost “After School Special” in its message about not letting the trials and tribulations of life get you down.

The only miss of the bunch is probably “Karen Walech,” which isn’t an entirely bad song, though it sounds sloppy compared to the rest of the album. It is certainly a shame that The Cheifs didn’t stick around for more than a few years. While they were privileged to share the stage with the likes of Black Flag, TSOL, Social D and Agent Orange in their brief run, a few more years and a few more albums would have solidified The Cheifs as one of the more influential acts of their time.

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