REVIEW OF CHEEM’S LATEST LP POWER MOVE

12-29-25

The boys are on a heater. 2024 was the year of Fast and Faster (though no Fastest or 2 Fast 2 Furious) Fashion. Following these two exquisite EPs the genre agnosticians from Connecticut have delivered the eleven-track LP Power Move as, according to the band's Instagram, "a goal, an assignment for us to level up everything that defines CHEEM." Already-strong vocalist Skye Holden's singing voice is the clearest level-up (think Fred Durst on Still Sucks), his deeper voice and dancehall reggae-informed rapping the essential yin to the yang of Sam Nazaretian's higher, Brandon Urie-like register, though I do feel that otherwise this album is less a level-up and more a sonic continuation of last year's material when the band really hit their stride. It's the sound of a band comfortable in the skin of what I call retrofuturist art rock for the mall food court and they describe as nü pop; per the description of the band on their January 26th gig page at The Camel in Richmond, Virginia: "Basically, what that means is that in the early 2000’s, nu metal and boy bands coexisted on mainstream radio without anyone ever thinking of combining the two; Cheem is here to fix that oversight." The operative word here is "basically," as reggae, dance music, theatrical mall emo, funk, and more are expertly mixed on the band's sonic palette, melding various influences and styles for the canvas without being what I call “spaghetticore” (throw everything at the wall and see what sticks). If, however, we accept that the Backstreet Boys and Limp Bizkit are the binary points of the Cheem universe, as Tom Ewing wrote about Azealia Banks’s "212" applied instead to Power Move, "its popcraft and its shock tactics are each other's Trojan horses—concentrate on one and the other sneaks up on you." Replace "song" with "record," and, continuing with Ewing, "the more you dig into the song, the more you can hear details and decisions that suggest a scary degree of pop talent."

That "scary degree of pop talent" is evident from the jump with the insanely catchy "Pivot" and remains a consistent feature right through the chilled-out earworm of an album closer in "TMZ." "Freeze Tag's" upbeat mall emo closes with a chill hip-hop beat that segues into what for me is the star of the LP’s show in “Gorilla Glue,” featuring a chorus that "just sticks and sticks and sticks and sticks on repeat" in my head long after the song is over. There are numerous elements working in synergy on the track, which serves as a microcosm of what is the improbable coherence of their sound "on paper," whether that be the verse riff that could be on a hardcore album with different vocals, Holden's dancehall reggae-informed rapping, that memorable chorus, or the band's reimaging of 1997 Incubus.

"Quench" featuring pulses. is a delightful, breezy reggae track, while the yacht-funk of "Nano" showcases a rhythm section that’s tighter than a Victorian Era corset, with some brief forays into rap-rock. The appropriately-named "Octane" is a driving, high-energy track with some of the heaviest riffing on the record; the foundation of "Octane" is straight from what Sarge D called the "tr00nami" era of hardcore-adjacent pop punk in the early 2010s (think pizza, friends, and Tumblr) with the ghost of S.C.I.E.N.C.E.-era Incubus haunting the track’s edges. "Spin Cycle" is another song that looks to S.C.I.E.N.C.E.-era Incubus, more specifically "Magic Medicine." Interestingly enough, my mind immediately went back to 1997 again on "Password," its atmosphere reminiscent of that of 311's Transistor. What the band does with the opening riff of "Elastic" featuring MC Taya is really interesting as in isolation it sounds like a revivalcore riff but instead it forms the backbone of yet another catchy chorus on the rap-funk-rock track with a soupçon of Cameo.

There simply aren’t enough bands out there like this who aren’t afraid to take creative risks and continually push themselves and at the same time make it sound so effortless. Instead of resting on their laurels, Cheem followed up Fast and Faster Fashion with an LP that stands shoulder-to-shoulder with 2024's fearlessly unconstrained sonic successes, continuing to explore this wide-open landscape of nü pop. Power Move showcases a band at the height of their powers, crafting accessible yet nuanced songs with dynamic and diverse songwriting. I have Anthony Bourdain no reservations about saying this is easily one of the best albums of 2025.