Neon Blonde is the side project of Blood Brothers singer Johnny Whitley and drummer Mark Gajadhar. Neon Blonde keeps all of the elements that have made The Blood Brothers such a success, the frenzied music over the spastic vocal stylings, yet has added a fun dance element. Johnny Whitney is ****ing brilliant. Very few vocalists come along on this planet that cannot be replicated or imitated and he is certainly one of them. The Blood Brothers’ frontman has been described in the past, by me, as sounding like “a cat with its balls caught in a mouse trap.” I stand by that description and would like to now add on “has the crooning power to make my panties drop.” Their album Chandeliers in the Savannah is a wonderfully diverse record that will either make your heart or your brain explode if listened to too loudly. I would love to tell you what the songs are about, but I have absolutely no idea. I can’t understand what he’s saying, save for a word or phrase here and there. Sounds intense though.

On the material I received it says “For Fans Of: Brian Eno, David Bowie and Freddy Mercury.” If you’ve ever heard Johnny Whitley sing, those comparisons might seem far-fetched. However, after listening to this album numerous times, I think I finally get it. It’s not art rock, it’s not glam, it’s not dance, and yet it is all of those things. Electrartglamdance. Rockglamdanceart. Something like that. At times throughout the record you can hear very clearly Freddy Mercury’s falsetto voice resonating in Whitley, and brash digital “Low” era Bowie inspired tunes like “Love Hounds” and “Wings”. One thing Whitley certainly has in common is his larger than life presence, which shines throughout the album. So the comparison, I believe to be accurate, however it is not the aspects of the artists that made them popular Neon Blonde taps into, it’s the aspects that made them legendary.

Although sharing the wild but controlled chaos of The Blood Brothers, Neon Blonde is slightly more accessible to the mainstream, with standout tracks like the somewhat surprising ballad “Chandeliers and Vines” in which Whitley trades in the ferocious screams for a very clean croon, faintly reminiscent of “Benny and the Jets.” “The Future Is A Mesh Stallion” displays Neon Blonde’s take on hip hop, with “Headlines” featuring a serious Calypso influence in the drum programming, and then tap into the dark side with a tango called “Cherries In Slow Motion.” It’s a hectic and exhausting album, which is typical of Whitley’s style, seemingly wanting the listener to be left breathless and sweating. Between barks, screams and wails high atop melodies and rhythms tapping into a broad range of influences from the ballads to the very Prince-influenced dance pop, Neon Blonde have crafted an enjoyable record of frantic fury definitely worth checking out.