John Chajka is pissed off. And his band, The Clockmen - with drummer Adam Pawlukiewicz and guitarist Nick Walters - is a perfect opportunity for him to vent his blue-collar blues, and to stretch his creative legs outside the bands he's done time in already, like The Grinders and The Staggers.

As a band, The Clockmen is a perfect example of the punk-rock conformist contradiction, and the music that comes from that tug of war. Punk has always championed the new, the different, the unique. But as a movement, that's nearly impossible to sustain. The Clockmen accept the challenge, blending the classic calamity of punk's innovators while trying to carve out its own place. This vacillation, this creative agitation and unpredictability - especially in the hands of this relatively new local trio - makes for some great music with the band members' past endeavors as key to the group's success as their collective talent.

Put simply, The Clockmen produce straight-ahead rock 'n' roll rants; it's angry young men and loud guitars. Underneath that are the nuances that bands spend their whole lives longing for. The Clockmen have found theirs. Live, they'll hit you over the head with them. And the band is banging it out at Ohmco Studios this winter for its debut release, "No, You're Fired."

The boys stopped by the City Newspaper offices for some lukewarm coffee, stale Christmas cookies, and to sing the blues. Here's an edited transcript of what was said.

CITY: What I first noticed about the band were the gang vocals.

John Chajka: We can't harmonize, so we do the next best thing. Sometimes I don't want to be a single voice.

And that gives more emphasis, more punch?

Chajka: Yeah, the band is based on the frustration of the working life, so it has to be a big sound.

And with the audience singing along, bigger yet.

Chajka: Yeah, but they'd have to learn the songs first.

How'd The Clockmen get started?

Chajka: I was looking for a project of my own where I could write my own songs. In the other bands I was in, I'd written songs but we never used them.

Because they didn't fit or it wasn't your band?

Chajka: Both. And I didn't want to sound like the other bands, so I changed up how we would attack it. I wanted it to sound different. We recently did the CBGB's tribute show. We did Richard Hell, Television, Dead Boys, Talking Heads, and The Ramones. The narrative of that whole CBGB thing is probably almost as good as the music itself. The 1970's - Foghat, Boston, all these big rock bands - and then comes this scene where they just kind of change it up with three-minute songs and this whole artistic approach. That's what inspired me to do this.

So you're rebelling within the scene here, trying to break out?

Chajka: I mean, we have influences within the scene. We love Gaylord, we love what The Isotopes do.

If you had nothing to not sound like, what would you sound like?

Chajka: Well, that's interesting, because I think I borrow a lot from these bands as well. There's definitely that structure of the whole GaragePop scene I've taken. But what would it sound like? Probably a mess. It would probably be all over the place. It wouldn't be as good as it is.

Adam Pawlukiewicz: You can't help it; every band you're in you take something from and bring it to your current band.

And then it evolves on its own.

Chajka: You have this idea, then you throw Nick in here, and Adam in here, and they don't play what you're thinking in your head. They come up with something else and it's even better.

Pawlukiewicz: We all play off each other and it turns into something better than what we came in with.

What is the Clockmen sound at this point?

Nick Walters: For me, it's everything through a punk filter. Outside of that I'd say it was sorta experimental and inclusive. Saying "experimental" may not be entirely accurate; we're not out there.

Just new?

Walters: Perhaps. I think we recognize the obvious thing to do and almost do the opposite. We try to stay outside typical structures. We still do a verse/chorus, that type of thing. Lose that and you've lost something kind of important.

Chajka: "Experimental" is all relative to what's going on.

Lyrically, you're a little more straight-forward.

Chajka: It's all relative to my life. It's just frustration with the working life right now. The past five years I've gone from job to job to job. Every single job was different but I hated it just the same. I'm not going to talk about the job I just got, but I've done telemarketing, I've done sales, I've worked at a TV station, a pet store, I've prepared taxes for people...and you end up not liking your boss, the customers, and sometimes you don't like your co-workers.

It's a universal gripe.

Chajka: Who can't relate to that, the frustration of the working life?

What if The Clockmen was your full-time job?

Chajka: I don't like doing taxes, I don't like selling dog food. But if I could play every day...