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SXSW preview: Surfer Blood
Even by the standards of an instant-gratification, download-now world, Surfer Blood’s rise from non-existence to buzz band status has been fast.
The band, which hails from West Palm Beach, Fla., didn’t even really exist about a year ago. Now they’re on a headlining tour and the band’s debut album, ‘Astro Coast,’ released in January on Kanine Records, is one of this year’s catchiest rock records, an amalgamation of every bubble-grunge ’90s guitar hook thirty-somethings remember from college keggers. It’s already moved about 17,000 copies, which is pretty amazing for a debut on an indie.
Except these kids were toddlers or infants when ‘Nevermind’ and Weezer’s ‘Blue Album’ changed lives. Surfer Blood singer/guitarist/mastermind John Paul ‘JP’ Pitts is 23, drummer Tyler Schwarz is 23, guitarist Thomas Fekete is 21. Bassist Brian Black and percussionist Marcos Marchesani are both 20. Remember when rock music was played by young people? These are those young people.
And they are waiting to get to Canada when I catch up with Pitts on the phone. (‘I am also eating a sandwich,’ Pitts says. Ah, the excitement of rock ‘n’ roll.)
Pitts comes by his way with a tune honestly. ‘My dad and his side are the musical ones,’ Pitts says. ‘He’s the sort of guy who can hear any song once or twice or pick it out by ear.’
Growing up, Pitts got the late ’90s/early ’00s version of a classic rock education. Pitts rattles off the names of some of his favorite albums: ‘The Beach Boys’ “Pet Sounds,” The Smiths’ “The Queen is Dead,” Dinosaur Jr.’s “You’re Living All Over Me,” Pavement’s “Slanted and Enchanted,” ’ Pitts says. ‘I was in the eighth grade when I heard the Strokes. I thought they were awesome.’
Pitts says Florida’s music scene is small and, as such, inspires serious devotion: ‘You’d get these 14-year-olds who are out of their minds driving up to play house shows (hours away).”
He and Schwarz met in college in 2006 in Orlando, Fla. ‘It didn’t take very long to before we realized we liked a lot of the same music and it felt really natural to play together,’ Pitts says. ‘We’ve been writing songs together since then, mostly about girls. But I try not to be too whiny or too directly emotive.’
At a party, he met Fekete, Black and Marchesani. Thus was formed Surfer Blood.
They headed into the studio with some songs, thinking they would get basic tracking done. ‘But we were kinda broke,’ Pitts says ‘and we felt like we were rushing everything. So we decided to just concentrate on the drum tracks.’
After that they took the project into Pitts’ apartment in Boca Raton, Fla., spending the next six months recording, mixing and overdubbing what became ‘Astro Coast.’ Doing it at home kept costs low. ‘We got a whole ProTools rig for about $200 through the college,’ Pitts says. ‘I would love to do something to analog tape when we actually have, like, a budget and stuff.’
Maybe they don’t need a real studio. Wisely, they started touring nonstop in 2009, building buzz, signing to Brooklyn-based indie Kanine Records. They knocked out 10 shows at last year’s College Music Journal Music Marathon. And people sure as heck loved the single ‘Swim,’ a guitar burner that takes you right back to 1994. The truth is nobody ever gets tired of thinking about the past and it’s time to think about the Clinton years that way. No wonder people are interested.
‘It’s really nutty but it’s also really, really fulfilling,’ Pitts says of this out of the box success. He sounds like he finished his sandwich. Time to conquer Canada.
1 a.m. Wednesday at Wave Rooftop, 408 E. Sixth St.
12:15 a.m. Friday at Lustre Pearl, 97 Rainey St.
11 p.m. Saturday at Mohawk Patio, 912 Red River St.
If you like Surfer Blood, check out:
1. Circa Survive
2. Titus Andronicus
3. The Constellations
4. Best Coast
5. Free Energy
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