The League of Assholes is an experimental noise group which has at various times featured Marcelo Radulovich (Nicey Nice World), Randy Chiurazzi, Frank Melendez (Riververb), Bobby Bray (Innerds, the Locust), MJ Stevens (who play a 100-string guitar), Esteban Flores, Peter Graves, and others.
“Frank, Marcello, and Bobby are like a three headed sonic super genius that I get to work with,” says Randy Chiurazzi, a former member of King Crimson virtuoso guitarist Robert Fripp's League of Crafty Guitarists who has come full circle in joining forces with the League of Assholes.
“The idea is to do sonic alchemy. We want to vary textures and dynamics from piece to piece as we build to the wall of sound. A player gives a short concept phrase or just a word that suggests a kind of texture, then we see where it takes us. We will probably create a short list from the longer list we come up with. We have tried, ‘build down’, ’Riververb cave bed’, ‘slomo’, ‘the gentle one’, and some others. So, it could get rambunctious!
“Bobby has designed some primo effects using a digital signal process designer called pure data, two players feeding off one suit into one master effect filter. Marcello is doing unheard of things to a radio, and Frank is finding the right shit at the right time. Bobby came up with the League...mantra?-‘the league of assholes never takes a shit.’”
In January 2017, inspired by the rise of Donald Trump, Radulovich gathered over 20 other musicians to create a spooky, raunchy sound collage called In Ogre Ate. "This album is a response to a changing of high guards," he says, "from an imperfect, empathic, intelligent, inspiring man who does not fall asleep at his watch, to a boisterous glutton who abandons his post in order to feed on extra rations, a petty clown who inspires distrust, an ogre who should have stayed in his castle."
Contributors include Christopher Adler, James Call, Spud Davenport, Barney Firks, Esteban Flores, FM Watson, Bill Wesley, and more. "In Ogre Ate is made up of numerous contributions from individuals across the USA and Europe, from harsh layers of distorted guitar, to jagged piano and plastic bag, to strange vocalizations, sound design, theremin, drums, digitally altered old cassette recordings of Russian church bells, and a variety of sounds, a sander sanding a distorted bass, screams into phones, a 97 year old woman saying "no, NO!" while watching the inauguration on TV...all in virtual unity, chipping in in their unique way to help push the purge."
The anti-Trump theme continued when a new League of Assholes album appeared in early 2018, Im Peach the Sequel, a “sound-collage” assembled from contributions sent to Radulovich. "When I thought about creating a collage with Trump as the topic, I knew that League of Assholes was the perfect name to use."
The band released a new album in 2020 called Unplugged. "It follows the process and tradition of previous L of A albums," says Marcelo Radulovich, "and features new participants and explores this very strange period we are experiencing. Over 30 minutes of sonic acrobatics and inspired performances, recorded by participants in quarantine, assembled by myself at my studio...this album is definitely a pop corn muncher worthy of a few listens."
In 2022, Radulovich reported "The new League of Assholes album I’m currently assembling is sounding really good. There are 21 participants so far and the sound, flow, and vibe are all on the up side in the face of current unnerving events. It's been over a year and a half since our last album so, for me, putting this thing together feels fresh and exciting. I’m aiming at releasing it on August 8. The album, which will be our ninth album and is titled A Really Stupid and Futile Gesture, will be available as a free download, like all the other League albums."