I missed the debut album from this Italian quintet, so this took me by surprise. Diabolico Coupe play modern-traditional surf with sax and for the most part stick to the straight-and-narrow surf sound: no spy, Western, etc. That's fine, because they're very good at it. The guitars trade off between each other well enough to the point where I found myself tuning in and out of different guitar parts, listening to different layers of the sound. The sax is great, often adding an extra oomph when they're looking for power, and even taking the lead on their excellent cover of Link Wray's "Slinky". The production is excellent; every instrument can be picked apart despite how much there is going on, there's a great sense of space, and their great surftone comes through.
Upon taking a second look at this, the official release date is December 18th (which is when it finds its way to CD) but you can preorder that now or go ahead and buy the digital version.
