Kevin Bronson on January 26th, 2009

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The way they bond, Jonathan Hylander and Sean Johnson may as well be twin drummers of different mothers. The pair, the driving force behind the Voyeurs, were pounding the skins for different South Bay bands when they met. They went on to play in the formidable but ill-fated (and hard to type) quartet E>K>U>K before bouncing back to write and record their Voyeurs debut, “Well Known Drag.”

Between then, they also play in about 54 other bands (actually, four), so you’d think they’d grow tired of one another. But over burgers in Burbank on a recent afternoon, here they were finishing each other’s sentences while talking about how liberated they feel having put the drama of the music business behind them. Hylander: “We both realized that being famous …” Johnson: “… or being on ‘Dick Clark’s Rockin’ New Year’s Eve’ …” Hylander: “… just wasn’t important.”

• ||| Download: “Things People Say”

Being true to their music, however, is. “Well Known Drag” brims with form-fitting pop that appeals to the inner Beatle, Kink and Costello, and whether they play as a two- or four-piece the Voyeurs bring their songs to life with agility and passion. Hylander plays the keyboards like Ben Folds in a ‘roid rage; Johnson’s theatrical drumming is so Keith Moon that observers have been left with you-gotta-be-kiddin’-me smirks. It’s as if Johnson in channeling every ounce of frustration into his playing. “Yes, I am,” he says. “If I didn’t, I’d be a most hated man.”

Only a year ago, the pair had high hopes for E>K>U>K – a couple record deals, songs placed in movies, momentum. “Then it all got pulled out from under us,” Hylander says. “It was a frustrating period of time, but we had done a lot of cool things, and as far as I’m concerned, we haven’t stopped our trajectory.”

Adds Johnson: “What we’ve accomplished the last six months with the Voyeurs is more gratifying than anything we did in E>K>U>K.”

Even outside the Voyeurs, they remain two of the busiest bodies in a robust L.A. scene, contributing to Vaudeville, Wet Cassette, the Damselles and the Shirley Rolls. “What can we say? We like to play music,” Hylander says. “Every good scene is a little bit incestuous.” Adds Johnson, laughing: “Jillinda Palmer (one of his bandmates in the Damselles) calls me a whore, but that’s not true – whores get paid. I’m a slut.”

But seriously, Johnson says, the Voyeurs hope the unbridled but not unvarnished songs on “Well Known Drag” (being released on Johnson’s own Otik Records and digitally via local imprint JAXART), have lives of their own. “So much of music today is first, [a band’s] look, then sound, then songs,” he says. “I’m hoping we’re the opposite.”

||| Live: The Voyeurs’ record-release show is Tuesday at the Echo, along with Go West Young Man, the Monolators and Les Blanks. It’s also the album-release show for Go West Young Man.

Photo of the Voyeurs as a two-piece at December’s “A Night of Charitable Music” benefit at the Echoplex.