Frankie and the Pool Boys are still allowed to be a called a supergroup (because they’re super!), but I think they’re done being a side project. For one, they’re a band now -- a core group of members playing on every song instead of a hodgepodge gang of guest artists. And at three LPs they’re starting to rival or exceed the output of some of the bands their members were known for.

Center of the Surf is a live recording of surf giants The Madeira playing at the 2017 Surfguitar101 Convention in Torrance, CA: essentially the center of US surf music fandom and surf music history. Present in the audience was Mark Linett, a 3-time grammy winning producer and engineer capturing it all.

Sonido Gallo Negro isn’t a surf band but I’ve noticed that they’ve got a lot of surf fans. After months of drifting around on Spotify, their third LP has finally seen a proper release.

Go to their bandcamp page and it says released January 18th and I've been listening to this one since then, but they told me their album release date was March 30th so I waited a bit. With that extra time I've been trying to nail down what it is I like about CARLO but it remains elusive. It's hard to even pick out a real standout track, as I've found this record is best taken as a whole. It's the mood really, laid-back and adventurous at once, like a day trip to a swimming hole.

A new album from Arno de Cea and the Clockwork Wizards is a stop-what-you’re-doing thing. He’s on top of his game and delivering a surf sound that nobody else has. But admittedly, two tracks in I found myself a little apprehensive about writing this review. What more is there to say about his nearly-perfected, patentable Brutal Surf? After two albums of the stuff, are there any worlds left to obliterate? 

New Orleans’ instro scene is a weird one but as of lately a surprisingly active one.

It’s been great watching Blackball Bandits find their way from a couple of bandcamp so-called-demos to a proud members of the Double Crown roster (and featured on the soundtrack to a remake of one of my favorite games). They’ve done a great job of retrofitting retro surf feel and attitude to more modern surf song structures.

Everything Volcano Kings has released has warped surf in exciting ways and done so in such an expert way that it seems like it must come easy. Despite the title, this is surf guitar before it's crime jazz and noir, but it you can find that pounding forward-moving drive of crime-jazz and some smoky mystery from a noir. But then you've got "Mechanical Beast" like some sort of steampunk wild west soundtrack and some cyberpunk electronic mayhem on "Night Life". They're all over the place, but everywhere they go is great.

The Terrorsurf have a new LP of trashy surf tunes and even pressed it to vinyl. Bands with a lo-fi sound like theirs often seem like a weird fit for vinyl but it turns out this is a bit nicer of a sound than they had on their 2016 debut under this name. They’re not really lo-fi anymore (they claim to be Zombiphonic Hi-Fi) and they’re better for it: it’s still got a punk momentum and it’s still usually dealing in a low, scummy mood (but not always!). They’ve also added a second guitarist, expanding what they’re able to do in a big way.

Hypnotide's debut LP Landlocked was a surprise favorite from 2015. With only 6 tracks, Hypnotide can't possibly show the same flexibility with their sound that they did on the LP, and they don't really attempt to.