Biography
Damon Locks engages across post-hardcore, dub, jazz, spoken word, sound collage, and additional territories while also functioning as a DJ, visual artist, and educator. Based in Chicago, the musician has partnered with an extensive range of practitioners from multiple fields. During the 1990s he served as frontman for Trenchmouth, probing the edges of post-hardcore; the subsequent decade brought his enduring membership in Rob Mazurek’s Exploding Star Orchestra and parallel movement through dub, jazz, and vanguard improv alongside the Eternals. In 2015 he established the Black Monument Ensemble, whose debut full-length Where Future Unfolds surfaced in 2019 after extended rehearsal and live presentation; NOW, captured outdoors amid the pandemic, followed in 2021. Subsequent projects include the 2023 multimedia collaboration New Future City Radio with Mazurek and the solo albums 3D Sonic Adventure (2024) and List of Demands (2025).
Locks grew up in Silver Spring, Maryland, relocated to New York at age 18 for study at the School of Visual Arts, and two years afterward settled in Chicago to attend the School of the Art Institute of Chicago while holding positions at the Field Museum of Natural History and the Spertus Institute of Jewish Studies. Shortly after arrival he formed the free-form post-hardcore group Trenchmouth with Wayne Montana; their debut album Snakebite was recorded in 1989. The band continued as a recording and touring entity until 1996, after which Montana and Locks launched the Eternals in 1999. That ensemble adopted an unrestricted approach anchored in free-flowing dub processes and issued its self-titled debut long-player in 2000.
Locks’ creative reach extended beyond music into regular presentations of visual and sound art at coffee shops, galleries, and clubs. These activities led to connections with numerous figures on Chicago’s music scene, among them fellow visual artist and musician Rob Mazurek, with whom he first collaborated in Isotope 217 alongside John Herndon and Jeff Parker. Additional appearances occurred on recordings by the Jai-Alai Savant, Joan of Arc, and Josh Larue, while the Eternals released Rawar Style and Out of Proportion, both in 2004. After Heavy International in 2007, Locks joined Mazurek’s Exploding Star Orchestra for Bill Dixon with the Exploding Star Orchestra (2008) and Stars Have Shapes (2010). Parallel to these activities he taught extensively in schools and at Statesville men’s prison. The Eternals delivered Approaching the Energy Field in 2011; ESO projects in 2013 comprised the music-and-video set The Space Between (credited to Exploding Star Electro Acoustic Ensemble), Matter Anti-Matter featuring special guest Roscoe Mitchell, and Galactic Parables, Vol. 1, with a further ESO album appearing in 2015.
That same year Locks assembled the solo sound-collage piece Where Future Unfolds, initially drawing samples from Civil Rights-era speeches and recordings to generate an improvisational framework for drum-machine performance. Over subsequent years the project expanded into a 15-piece ensemble incorporating clarinetist Angel Bat Dawid and drummer Dana Hall, with flexible personnel scaling for different settings. Operating as the Black Monument Ensemble, the group fused and extended the aesthetics of fellow Chicagoan Phil Cohran & the Artistic Heritage Ensemble, trumpeter Eddie Gale’s Black Rhythm Happening, Archie Shepp’s Attica Blues, and Public Enemy’s It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back, merging gospel, jazz, hip-hop, social activism, and 808-style electro breaks. The ensemble’s first performance of Where Future Unfolds occurred at the Garfield Park Botanical Conservatory during the Red Bull Music Festival in November 2018; International Anthem issued the concert recording as an album in spring 2019.
Locks contributed lyrics and vocals to Exploding Star Orchestra’s Dimensional Stardust in 2020. During the COVID-19 summer of that year he and the Black Monument Ensemble installed instruments, microphones, and recording equipment in the garden of Chicago’s Experimental Sound Studio and pressed record; seven selections were captured in a handful of live takes despite the musicians’ unfamiliarity with the material. International Anthem released the sessions as NOW in April 2021. In March 2023 Locks resumed his role with Exploding Star Orchestra on Lightning Dreamers; that July the label issued New Future City Radio, the multimedia duo project with Mazurek. The following year Locks issued 3D Sonic Adventure in a limited vinyl-only edition on his own Recording Device imprint. Exploratory solo work continued in 2025 with International Anthem’s release of List of Demands, a sample-driven effort featuring instrumentation from Ben LaMar Gay, Macie Stewart, and Ralph Darden together with a spoken contribution from poet Krista Franklin.
Locks grew up in Silver Spring, Maryland, relocated to New York at age 18 for study at the School of Visual Arts, and two years afterward settled in Chicago to attend the School of the Art Institute of Chicago while holding positions at the Field Museum of Natural History and the Spertus Institute of Jewish Studies. Shortly after arrival he formed the free-form post-hardcore group Trenchmouth with Wayne Montana; their debut album Snakebite was recorded in 1989. The band continued as a recording and touring entity until 1996, after which Montana and Locks launched the Eternals in 1999. That ensemble adopted an unrestricted approach anchored in free-flowing dub processes and issued its self-titled debut long-player in 2000.
Locks’ creative reach extended beyond music into regular presentations of visual and sound art at coffee shops, galleries, and clubs. These activities led to connections with numerous figures on Chicago’s music scene, among them fellow visual artist and musician Rob Mazurek, with whom he first collaborated in Isotope 217 alongside John Herndon and Jeff Parker. Additional appearances occurred on recordings by the Jai-Alai Savant, Joan of Arc, and Josh Larue, while the Eternals released Rawar Style and Out of Proportion, both in 2004. After Heavy International in 2007, Locks joined Mazurek’s Exploding Star Orchestra for Bill Dixon with the Exploding Star Orchestra (2008) and Stars Have Shapes (2010). Parallel to these activities he taught extensively in schools and at Statesville men’s prison. The Eternals delivered Approaching the Energy Field in 2011; ESO projects in 2013 comprised the music-and-video set The Space Between (credited to Exploding Star Electro Acoustic Ensemble), Matter Anti-Matter featuring special guest Roscoe Mitchell, and Galactic Parables, Vol. 1, with a further ESO album appearing in 2015.
That same year Locks assembled the solo sound-collage piece Where Future Unfolds, initially drawing samples from Civil Rights-era speeches and recordings to generate an improvisational framework for drum-machine performance. Over subsequent years the project expanded into a 15-piece ensemble incorporating clarinetist Angel Bat Dawid and drummer Dana Hall, with flexible personnel scaling for different settings. Operating as the Black Monument Ensemble, the group fused and extended the aesthetics of fellow Chicagoan Phil Cohran & the Artistic Heritage Ensemble, trumpeter Eddie Gale’s Black Rhythm Happening, Archie Shepp’s Attica Blues, and Public Enemy’s It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back, merging gospel, jazz, hip-hop, social activism, and 808-style electro breaks. The ensemble’s first performance of Where Future Unfolds occurred at the Garfield Park Botanical Conservatory during the Red Bull Music Festival in November 2018; International Anthem issued the concert recording as an album in spring 2019.
Locks contributed lyrics and vocals to Exploding Star Orchestra’s Dimensional Stardust in 2020. During the COVID-19 summer of that year he and the Black Monument Ensemble installed instruments, microphones, and recording equipment in the garden of Chicago’s Experimental Sound Studio and pressed record; seven selections were captured in a handful of live takes despite the musicians’ unfamiliarity with the material. International Anthem released the sessions as NOW in April 2021. In March 2023 Locks resumed his role with Exploding Star Orchestra on Lightning Dreamers; that July the label issued New Future City Radio, the multimedia duo project with Mazurek. The following year Locks issued 3D Sonic Adventure in a limited vinyl-only edition on his own Recording Device imprint. Exploratory solo work continued in 2025 with International Anthem’s release of List of Demands, a sample-driven effort featuring instrumentation from Ben LaMar Gay, Macie Stewart, and Ralph Darden together with a spoken contribution from poet Krista Franklin.
Albums
Singles
