Dead Pioneers is rooted in a 2020 piece called The Punk Pan-Indian Romantic Comedy, a deeply personal work that dealt with vocalist Gregg Deal’s cultural upbringing. Following an embryonic performance of the piece, Deal secured a grant to expand it to include music created especially for the work. “The idea was to mix spoken-word with punk music” explains Deal, who hooked up with drummer Shane Zweygardt and guitarist Abe Brennan during lockdown and began kicking the concept around.
But what became Dead Pioneers didn’t truly take shape until Deal connected with bassist Lee Tesche, who you may know from righteous Atlantan post-punks Algiers. Unlikely as it sounds, a conversation between Tesche and Deal about Sleaford Mods evolved into a creative connection that’s now three albums deep; the arrival of guitarist Joshua Rivera made the quintet quorate. “Josh is Mexican-American,” says Deal. “He is also inherently indigenous, under a different set of circumstances within colonialism. But I consider him to be my indigenous brother. We spend a lot of time trying to figure out how all of this fits together.”
A miraculous, natural chemistry made this supposed one-off project an actual band almost as soon as they cut what became their 2023 self-titled debut album.
TRACKLIST:
SIDE A
1. Dead Presidents
2. Nazi Teeth (feat. Stephanie Byrne / Cheap Perfume)
3. A Message From Mr. Bell
4. No Kings
5. Animals That Roam The Earth
6. Never Alone (feat. The Interrupters)
7. The Worst Among Us (feat. Jason Williamson / Sleaford Mods)
SIDE B
8. Seeing Red
9. Circle Jerk The Wagons
10. Zealots
11. Nobody
12. LFG
RIYL: IDLES, Bad Religion, Amyl and the Sniffers, Lambrini Girls, Bob Vylan, Soft Play & The Interrupters.