THE PIN-UP, Bloomington, IN (December 2002):

TURN PALE - 'Chance' 7"
In 2002, black is the new black.  And no one paints it blacker than Turn Pale.  The core of Panoply blows the dust off its old disco 12 inches and turns the beat all the way around until it snaps your heaad clean off.  Then Michael Anderson leaps down from his perch, picks your head up from the floor and, gazing into the lifeless eyes, delivers a soliloquy on love and loss and darkness.  All the while, your decapitated body is still shaking it like a demon on the dance floor at Studio 666.  And that's just the A side.

How was it that the evilest band in town also ended up being arguably the most fun?  Partly, it's in the timing: for the most part, Bloomington has been spared the glories and the atrocities of the eighties revivial that's run rampant elsewhere since the turn of the century.  But if it had to hit us, then the twisted fringe element is the perfect part of the eighties to revive.  After all, you can't kill Goth - it's already dead.

Having taken a generous bite out of the hearts of their fellow Bloomingtonians, Turn Pale took their revival on the road; if you haven't already, check out the excellent self-produced documentary of their April 2002 tour with Love Life, which plays all the time on BCAT.  2003 should see Turn Pale finally commit the rest of their instant club classics to record, but until then this single will remain in constant rotation on the turntable of every discriminating sociopath in town.

- Daniel Murphy

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