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Definitely some good commentary all around - I would only say that I got
into this music ass-backwards. Aside from enjoying the Pulp Fiction movie
and soundtrack, I got into this music by way of the newer stuff at the time,
and I got into that by way of rockabilly/garage bands like the Reverend
Horton Heat & Southern Culture on the Skids, The Cramps, The Mummies etc.
doing a college radio show in the early/mid 90s. Granted, half the time I
was severeley impaired, but my cohost (I give him 95% of the credit) and I
managed to play some of the cool music off the day - in addition to the
above mentioned artists, I vaguely remember playing the Phantom Surfers,
MOAM, Laika etc around '92/93/94. I think it was around 94/95 when I saw
MOAM open for SCOTS that I was really taken with the whole thing. So I had
built up a little collection of instro before I started getting into the
roots of it all. So basically, my enjoyment of the new stuff of the day got
me wondering about where it came from & then I worked my way backwards until
I found myself buying the green vinyl Swedish import 7" of "Underwater" by
The Frogmen.
Finks/Bomboras/Cads - I think the Finks album is pretty good, but nowhere
near what the Bomboras achieved 3-4 years later. However, I think it was a
logical progression that just happened to be documented on vinyl/disc. Like
so many bands today, they were young guys that got into surf (although
unlike alot of bands today, the covers they played were a little more
obscure), practiced their instruments, strived to get the sound & then
recorded what they knew how to play. Eventually (within a few short years),
they branched off into two really good bands that put out some really
quality stuff. So I view the Finks ablum as one small part of a bigger
history of those bands. Laika & The Cosmonauts, The Boss Martians & Satan's
Pilgrims followed a similar pattern, featuring some covers (some well known)
on their earlier works, but back in the early 90s, there weren't 40 or 50
bands recording Mr Moto and Squad Car, so it wasn't familiar cover
saturation at that point. Just like the original first wave bands, members
of these bands eventually evolved into playing other types of music. Yes,
the Finks CD is very cover heavy, but a short 4 years later they were
blowing my mind playing "War of the Satellites into Project Zero" as a five
piece band wearing skeleton suits with sombreros. Likewise with them, I
bought Organ Grinder first (Head Shrinkin was a couple of months from coming
out), bought the rest of their stuff & then found my way to the Finks &
eventually to The Crossfires (after doing some research because the original
artists werent credited). I think nowadays, alot of the bands are covering
the well-known original songs of the bands that influence them - the
Slacktones/Straitjackets, etc. which will certainly perpetuate the influence
of those songs - but unlike back in the day when many of the bands routinely
covered (and recorded) each others material (some having better success than
the composer), now you have copyrights to deal with, so if you want to
record and release "Calhoun Surf" on your own CD, make sure you give Daddy O
Grande the pesos he deserves (which for a 1000 CD run would equal about 896
pesos according to the exchange rate) Just be glad you don't have to pay
his ass in euros.
Another thing I noticed about the early 3rd wave bands is that unlike todays
bands, they only had the original stuff to draw from, so you have bands like
some mentioned above + ones like the Krontjong Devils pulling this real
obscuro stuff (or at the least beyond miserlou/walk don't run/pipeline
stuff) out of their arses - no hit or one or two hit wonders that they
either dug deep for or got on comps (Vulcan Records, etc). Bomboras and The
Space Cossacks doing "Third Star" - Cossacks giving new life to "The
Crusher" and "Bombora" - or at least introducing it to a new generation
Laika (and also the Apemen) doing Bahareeba back in the early 90s; MOAM
doing "Shockwave" and "Joker's Wild," etc. Like others mentioned as well -
you got guys like Deke and Untamed Youth playing "The Hearse" - back in the
mid 90s, there was certainly some due dligence going on in the research
department - really immersing themselves in the history of music and
learning some tunes. As kahunatikiman pointed out, many of the bands will
start out learning the same 5-10 songs, but in a few years, a few of those
same bands may be the ones putting out the next "Land of One Percenters"
ok that's all for now.
wait, I almost forgot......
If any of you east coast "fags" want to come out and see us not play
"Pipeline," we'll be doing our first ever New Year's Eve gig at our favorite
bowling alley/lounge venue - The Asbury Lanes in Asbury Park, NJ - a big to
do with a bunch of good bands including The Unidentified, Jimmy and the
Teasers and Sasquatch & the Sickabillies. More info @ the Nebulas site (as
well as some preliminary gigs already lined up for the California tour -
just for you west coast "fags")
that is all
tfj
www.thenebulas.com
----- Original Message -----
From: "kahunatikiman" <>
To: <>
Sent: Tuesday, December 28, 2004 7:34 PM
Subject: [SurfGuitar101] Re: Ivan's cool commentary: "Trad vs. Prog"
>
>
> This is a good topic! I always enjoy Ivan's posts, they are
> informative and very well thought out. my only critique would be if
> Ivan could do like they do at Reverborama, and call everyone "fag"
> more. ;-)
>
> I think it's safe to say we all got into surf music the same
> way, by hearing the first wave songs by the first wave bands. I
> agree with Ivan that nothing will sound like they did then. We
> are all just trying to do our version of that original sound.
>
> I'd bet all of us started out on the same 5-10 songs, trying as
> hard as we could to "sound like the record". For some of us, thats
> enough, for others, they feel compelled to try to update the sound,
> or the songs, or come up with their own ideas. One of my favorite
> things about surf music is the confines in which a song can be
> called surf music. For the most part, it's that original
> traditional sound. It may have evolved over the years, as
> everything does, but at the core is that reverb-driven sound.
