Ex-Oxbow Eugene Robinson to release new album with Buñuel, deliver new single "Drug Burn"

Oxbow vocalist Eugene S. Robinson recently announced his departure from the band he founded 35 years ago. This news was followed by a statement from his former bandmate Niko Wenner, declaring that the band "no longer exists" after an unspecified allegation was made against Wenner during their recent European tour.

In the wake of these developments, Robinson has revealed a new album from his other project, Buñuel, a band he's led since 2016, as well as sharing a new single, "Drug Burn". Buñuel features a lineup of Italian musicians, including Afterhours guitarist Xabier Iriondo, The Framers bassist Andrea Lombardini, and Il Teatro Delgiorrori drummer Franz Valente. 

Their upcoming album, Mansuetude—their fourth release—includes guest appearances from notable artists such as Converge's Jacob Bannon, The Jesus Lizard's Duane Denison, Couch Slut's Megan Osztrosits, cellist Andrea Beninati, and alto saxophonist/vocalist David Binney. The album was produced by Timo Ellis, the leader of the band Netherlands.

Robinson shared the following:

If you need to go, go big, and there, in our minds, was no bigger than the film director widely held to be one of the greatest filmmakers of all time. From the profane to the bitingly clever, Buñuel matched the spirit and dour wit that most matched what we wanted to say musically. To name the band Hitchcock might have been funnier, but we'll leave "funnier" for people who find the lives we lead and the certain deaths that they lead to, well, funny.

And going through Buñuel the band's initial trilogy – A Resting Place for Strangers, The Easy Way Out, and Killers Like Us – it's clear that musically this is the land of no compromise, and very little retreat. Moreover moving out a trilogy lots of questions needed to be asked, usually all about the necessity/need for another record. It's probably our good fortune that the record Mansuetude, coming to us in a dream as it was, continues with the Buñuelian darkscapes of failure, and fixed revenge. Really iD based horror.

Even with all of that, surprises abound because there are secrets I keep from you, secrets we keep together and the third category of them which have everything to do with the unexpected. In this instance the counterbalancing weight of the implosion of Oxbow. People had always asked what the difference was between the two bands and I have to say I always thought of it in Freudian terms. Oxbow being the superego and Buñuel being the iD.

And the heat and light kicked off by the iD, or a certain chaos incarnate, can both blind and illuminate. In the case of Mansuetude, with its…well, no other word comes in handy here: beauty.

As usual, the standard structure applies: you may not like/enjoy it, but not everyone likes or enjoys touches of the divine. Or put another way, when was the last time you saw a movie by Buñuel, even knowing how big of a genius he is?

Yeah: exactly.

A final and more pressing point for me is that all of the crazy I feel and embody in every moment both good and bad is here. Which is, really, both good and bad. I think it'll make more sense when you see us live. If you live long enough to be able to do so.