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The brainchild of Toronto, Ontario multi-instrumentalist/filmmaker
Dean Tzenos,
Odonis Odonis began in 2010 as a noisy fusion of shoegaze, surf, garage, and punk before transforming into a hard-edged industrial act. This darker, starker side to their music began to emerge on 2014's Polaris award-nominated
Hard Boiled Soft Boiled and came to the fore on later albums such as 2017's politically tinged
No Pop, which made the most of
Tzenos' sardonic viewpoint and sneering vocals.
While
Tzenos was growing up, his older sisters introduced him to '80s and '90s alternative rock such as
the Jesus and Mary Chain,
Big Black, and the
Pixies. He put those influences to use with
Ten Kens, a band he formed in 2003 as an art school student.
Ten Kens signed to FatCat Records and released their 2008 self-titled debut album before
Tzenos left the group. Around that time, he also broke up with his girlfriend and lost his job as a computer animator. To recuperate, he spent much of 2009 recording on his own.
Tzenos converted his den into a home studio and recorded dozens of demos within a few months. Inspired by the name of his friend Adonis Adonis, he christened the project
Odonis Odonis.
In May 2011,
Odonis Odonis' debut single, "Busted Lip," was released as a limited-edition 7" on We Are Busy Bodies, and the lineup expanded to include drummer/vocalist
Jarod Gibson and bassist/vocalist
Denholm Whale. That June, after
Odonis Odonis signed to FatCat,
Tzenos traveled to Vancouver to record with
Black Mountain's
Colin Stewart and
the New Pornographers'
Kurt Dahle and
Kathryn Calder. The following month, a split single with
Lotus Plaza (aka
Deerhunter's
Lockett Pundt) arrived on FatCat's sister label Palmist.
Odonis Odonis' debut album,
Hollandaze, arrived that November and kept the lo-fi feel of
Tzenos' original demos. The
Better EP, which featured the band's first recordings as a trio, was released in April 2013. A year later, the results of
Tzenos' Vancouver sessions were released as
Hard Boiled Soft Boiled, a set of songs split into an abrasive, industrial-inspired first half and a lush second half informed by dream pop. Released on
Tzenos' own Buzz Records, the album's acclaim included a nomination for that year's Polaris Music Prize.
Odonis Odonis resurfaced in 2016 with
Post Plague, a stark, synth-driven set inspired by science fiction and 21st century narcissism that highlighted the band's industrial leanings.
Tzenos and company went even further in this direction with the following year's
No Pop, which used the name of an anti-commercial music movement as the title of its moody forays into darkwave and industrial. While touring in support of the album, the band continued to write and record, and released the Reaction EP in April 2019. ~ Heather Phares