Sheverb noticeably have one of the surf community's favorite words portmanteau'd into their name, they've played surf shows like Austin's Surf By Surf East, and surf fans love 'em -- at a previous SG101 convention I remember hearing several people rave about catching them a few days before. But they've always been more of a spaghetti western band, which again has never stopped twang-loving surf fans, but I think it's best to set expectations: there's not much surf here. On She Rides Again, Sheverb have leaned into psychedelic effects, hypnotic rhythms, and desert-rock riffs.

It's December, I'm very busy working on the Gremmy Awards, but I have to squeeze in a review because this was sent to me months ago before the aire was frigid. And I would guess that Chad and Cherry won't be reviewing it, so somebody has to!

Bandcamp may have changed hands again recently, but it looks like they're still giving up their portion of sales on the first Friday of every month, so "all" of your money goes to the artists (so long as you count Paypal as an artist). And as semi-usual, I'll draw some focus to recent surf releases worth a look. October is always a big month for surf releases as bands try to cram stuff in before Halloween, but that hasn't started yet, so this is mostly un-spooky. I also didn't get a chance to do one of these last month, so it's reaching back a little further.

Back in 2016 Amphibian Man came out of nowhere with eight fantastic, high-energy releases in the span of about a year and a half. Things have changed a lot since then. The one-man project turned into a band, played shows, released a few more albums that were more of an instrumental skate/post/punk sound. And of course being from Ukraine there's there's the aspect of having your homeland invaded from Russia, a topic that I don't think I can begin to wrap my head around.

Music reviews typically are here to answer one question: Is it any good? I operate by a "if you don't have anything nice to say..." rule so my answer is always either "yes" or I avoid answering. However, a new Ventures record is under heavier scrutiny, and will likely face nastier questions like, "Are these actually The Ventures?" and "Should I even care?" After all, this is their first LP in 24 years, and the lineup contains zero original members.

Oh no. It's another Bandcamp Friday and I still have so much stuff to write about Surfguitar101 Festival. But there have also been so many releases I want to talk about! So as usual, I'm going to challenge myself to be as brief as possible while still saying something substantive. Buy these records!