John Dwyer is an underground rock lifer. He's best-known for leading California psych-rock institution OSEES and their various offshoots, but he's been in the game since his time in early-'00s noise-guitar bands like Coachwhips and Pink And Brown. Today, Dwyer unveils a new band, a team-up with someone who's been in the game for even longer.
David Barbarossa was the original drummer of new wave acts Adam And The Ants and Bow Wow Wow, which makes him the person who brought the big, stomping Burundi beat to post-punk England. Barbarossa has done a lot of other things since those days, too. Remember the '90s band Republica? "Ready To Go"? He was in that band, too. Baby, he was ready to go. Now, as Brooklyn Vegan points out, Barbarossa joins John Dwyer in Chime Oblivion, a new band that'll release a self-titled debut album this spring.
Chime Oblivion started after Dwyer met Barbarossa at an OSEES show. Dwyer says, "I reached out to David and suggested that we try and write some songs together. I flew David out, we met at my studio and spent five days writing basin drums ideas." Dwyer recruited the rest of the group. Singer H.L. Nelly was in the Oakland band Naked Lights, while synth player Tom Dolas is in OSEES and multi-instrumentalist Brad Caulkins comes from Dwyer's side project Bent Arcana. Guitarist Weasel Walter is a noise-rock veteran who's probably best-known for bands like the Flying Luttenbachers and XBXRX.
Dwyer says that Chime Oblivion is "for fans of Adam & the Ants, Bow Wow Wow, Crass, the Slits, and any other weirdo punk we fell in love with as youths." Their debut song "Neighborhood Dog" is an itchy, energetic, hard-pounding post-punk jam that lasts for less than two minutes, and it reminds me of OG post-punk bands like Essential Logic and X-Ray Spex. Below, check out "Neighborhood Dog" and the Chime Oblivion tracklist.
TRACKLIST:
01 "Incidental Synth 5"
02 "Neighbourhood Dog"
03 "Kiss Her Or Be Her"
04 "The Fiend"
05 "Incidental Synth 4"
06 "Heated Horses"
07 "The Uninvited Guest"
08 "And Again"
09 "The Mythomaniac"
10 "Smoke Ring"
11 "Incidental Synth 7"
12 "I'm Not A Mirror"
13 "Grass"
14 "Cold Pulse"
15 "The Catalogue"
Chime Oblivion is out 4/18 on Dwyer's Deathgod label.
