Critic's Choice

The life of Ohio's Brainiac came to a sharp, sad and unexpected close in 1997: Vocalist/keyboardist Tim Taylor was killed in a car accident just as the band he helped start was accelerating its experiments with avant-garde indie noise pop. Led by Brainiac guitarist John Schmersal, Enon, Wednesday, August 23,...

By Laura Bond

August 17, 2000

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The life of Ohio's Brainiac came to a sharp, sad and unexpected close in 1997: Vocalist/keyboardist Tim Taylor was killed in a car accident just as the band he helped start was accelerating its experiments with avant-garde indie noise pop. Led by Brainiac guitarist John Schmersal, Enon, Wednesday, August 23, at the 15th Street Tavern, shares its predecessor's fondness for found sound, fuzz and futurism: Believo!, the band's debut on the SeeThruBroadcasting imprint, is an atmospheric amalgamation of bona fide pop hooks, distortion, samples, voice-overs and lots of whirring, buzzing little noises. Enon's influences aren't limited to those that informed Brainiac, however; within Schmersal's dense song structures, you can hear strains of everything from Guided by Voices and George Harrison to Stravinsky and Saturday-morning cartoons. Rick Lee and Steve Calhoon of Skeleton Key round out Enon, which seems well-poised to pick up where Brainiac left off and head for exciting new parts unknown.

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