Old Time Relijun are the rarest breed of band. Insatiable, living raw, always on the margins and consistent as hell. You know what to expect and yet never have any clue what's going to come next. Old Time Relijun give sweaty, compulsively danceable performances that never fail to inflame their audience. Their songs are simple but no one else in the world could imitate them. Their albums are packed with sing-along hits, mixed with sonic experiments and inside jokes. Their loose swagger belies years of practice, fastidious arrangements and gut-level understanding of how music hits you.
Old Time Relijun was born on January 1st, 1995 in a dark and moldy basement in Olympia, Washington. The band stole some popcorn bags, talked a friend out of his inheritance and self-released “Songbook Vol. I” in 1997. They then began their long association with Calvin Johnson’s K Records.
Old Time Relijun maintained its singular identity through every musical landscape over the next dozen years.
Between 1999 and 2007, Old Time Relijun toured like monsters, averaging 150 shows a year in the U.S. and Europe, releasing “Uterus and Fire” [KLP 97], “La Sirena De Pecera” [KLP 110], “Witchcraft Rebellion” [KLP 128], “Lost Light” [KLP159], “2012 [KLP 171] and “Catharsis in Crisis” [KLP 184], The last three albums are known collectively as “The Lost Light Trilogy;” a conceptual triptych integrating poetry, painting, and myth through multiple lyrical and musical threads.
The band toured through 2008 and then quietly parted ways.
2019 reunites Old Time Relijun with newfound level of passionate indignation and a deeper musical vocabulary. There is no better time than this fucked up time in history to “get the band back together”: there is something magical that happens when a deep seeker straps on a guitar and plays rock’n’roll. Old Time Relijun makes music for the revolution from a restless energy that has never settled down.
This is a band that prefers its walls sweaty and smashes the shit out of every single sound you hear.
“One of the most distinctive and feral rock groups in the Northwest” - The Stranger
“...if anyone can pull of the unexpected, it’s them.” - Tiny Mix Tapes
