Melodically aggressive poetry.
From the emerging cultural cradle of Denton, Texas…The Singing Bones. 

Nick Anchondo has never really stopped moving, he’s just learned to change direction without losing momentum.
He came up in Southern California’s DIY underground, the kind of scene built from borrowed amps, duct-taped cables, and twenty-minute sets that felt like revolutions. Before anyone called him Chango, before the long drives and the tour vans, he was just a kid chasing noise with his friends — music first, plan later.

Those early years were all energy and experiment. He cut his teeth in bands that sound like inside jokes but played with real heart: One Guey, a scrappy ska-punk outfit full of brass, sweat, and friendship; Bozo & The Spit-Shined Dildos, an absurdist freak-jazz collision of chaos and invention; and Gonzo & The Junkies, a psychobilly garage project that somehow survived enough backyard sets to earn cult status in its little corner of the Inland Empire. Every group left a mark — a sense that art doesn’t need permission, it just needs volume and honesty.

In 2011, that same attitude landed him in The Rocketz, the East L.A. punkabilly power trio that would carry him through six years of near-constant motion. With his upright bass slung high and his glasses fogged from stage heat, Anchondo, lovingly nicknamed Chango, became a livewire presence. His slap bass was thunder and punctuation, the heartbeat that pushed songs like “Bob’s a Zombie!” and “Punk Rock Love Song” into controlled chaos. Between 2011 and 2017 he toured the U.S. and beyond, recorded albums like California Hell, and carved out a reputation as the calm eye inside the storm, the guy holding down the low end while everything else exploded.

By 2017, the miles started whispering for stillness. He stepped off the road, not out of defeat but curiosity, to see what kind of songs existed when the crowd wasn’t watching. He traded tour vans for four-tracks, distortion pedals for tape hiss. What eventually came next was Extra Foris, a self-released album that captures his love of imperfection: cracked guitars, no vocals, dust in the faders. Singles like “I'm a mess”, “Aurora”, “you know me so well,” and “If the world doesn't end” drift between lo-fi alt rock, folk textures, and desert stillness; music that feels handmade and lived-in.

Before that came Arrow Grove around 2019, a side project born from late-night experiments and gallows humor. Billing themselves as “lo-fi dad goth,” Arrow Grove blurred melancholy with self-awareness, pairing spectral synths and jangling guitars with lyrics that winked at the void. It was proof that Anchondo hadn’t lost his bite — he’d just learned to aim it inward.

Now based in Texas, Anchondo records, mixes, and produces from home — a workspace filled with guitars, coffee mugs, and the ghosts of every club he’s ever played. His music carries both dust and daylight: the echo of Southern California pavement, the hum of Hill Country nights, the crackle between heartbreak and humor. He’s not chasing nostalgia; he’s chasing truth, one imperfect take at a time.

From One Guey to Bozo & The Spit-Shined Dildos, from Gonzo & The Junkies to The Rocketz, from Arrow Grove to his own name on the spine of a record, Nick Anchondo has stayed the same at his core — a craftsman who believes music should sweat, smile, and mean something. Whether it’s the slap of a bass, the flicker of a synth line, or the sigh between verses, he builds sound like memory: layered, flawed, and still burning.

He’s lived with the noise and learned from the quiet.

My parents bought me my first bass guitar in 2002, I picked up the upright bass in 2004, and guitar in 2005. Started playing in a jazz band around Claremont, Ca somewhere between 2004/2005. In 2006 I joined my friend’s Skacore band One Guey and stuck with them for about 2 years. 2008 I started a band called Bozo & the Spit-Shined Dildos with my friends who, years later, went on to cultivate a legendary Freak Jazz ensemble. Throughout 2009 me and some other friends started a Psychobilly band called Gonzo & the Junkies which attained some moderate success in the backyard scene. In 2010 I took some time to attend college and met up with a former member of the Bozo outfit in a music class that got us playing together again and from then on that’s what we did whenever the opportunity arose. In comes 2011, I joined a popular L.A. based Punk/Rockabilly band, which I had tried out for back in 2007 and would have been a member since then had it not been for the fact that I was only 17 years old at the time. That year kicked off my career for years to come, I had toured the world, recorded some albums with a few bands, played with some big names, and met thousands of amazing people. In 2017 due to personal circumstances I had made the decision to put that life aside indefinitely, although that fire never dies, I still play, jam with my friends, and record whenever the inspiration strikes.

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