Chimes, Wandcarver, The Adventures of the Silver Spaceman, Sun Abduction

Chimes is a psychedelic shoegaze band that brides the gap between Bloomfield, NJ and Brooklyn, NY. Since their humble beginnings in a NJ basement, Jesse Benicaso (guitar/vox), Linda Chen (guitar/vox), Winston Scarlett (bass) & Sarah Peterson (drums) have evolved from their dream pop roots to harness a more raw punk sound that captures the slack skating-Pokemon playing youth of today. After a busy summer of local Brooklyn gigs, touring around the east coast and playing & their own bassist, Win, curating Slackfest, Chimes is ready to release their first single, Total Sunflower, unveiling their new sound to the psychedelic stoner masses.

Chimes has played all over NY and NJ at venues including Baby's Alright, Glasslands, and The Silent Barn, with Brooklyn bands such as Sunflower Bean, Haybaby, Lost Boy?, and many more.


Zach's new album, Don't Know Go (Nerdy Girl Records), is performed with an acoustic guitar on almost all songs, but the album ventures into all sorts of explorative sonic territory. It does achieve a sense of uneasy normalcy, while there is surrealistic flavor to every song – the bits of relative normalcy that you find could just be your mind trying to make sense of it all.

From various bits of unorthodox instruments to pretty and simple acoustic guitar riffs accompanied by layers upon layers of varied instrumentations, Don't Know Go ranges from tastefully sparse to surprisingly rich from one song to the next. There is a salient sense of a longing to explore and, perhaps more so, Zach's ability to turn sounds into musical play things.

The album is a fun, playful piece of work. It's a child's game of pretend, using some familiar forms as a platform to explore music's potential to communicate. It's a fully fleshed out peek behind the eyes of Mr. Zachary Ellis, where one finds a tiny bit of child's nostalgia, imagination and warmth, and maybe a bit of love too.