These days garage bands with a little bit of reverb on their vocals are called surf bands. Thankfully, there are still plenty of excellent groups out there that know what surf really sounds like. The following bands aren't aiming to reinvent anything, they're all about making great instrumentals with that irresistable sound cooked up in the 1960s.

This was a good year for trad surf groups and an interesting one. Most of the groups below are sort of rising stars of the scene who made their initial appearance only in recent years, without much presence from the more legendary 90's era groups. Here are what I believe to be the standouts.

Though they've been dropping a few nice singles here and there, it's been 15 years since we've had an LP from the Space Agency, and they remain as special as ever. Somewhere underneath layers of fuzz and pedals is a pretty trad surf group with great dead-simple melodies that honestly could sound more 1962 than many groups if they felt like it. Give a listen to the least dressed song on this record "Alpaca Boogie" to catch a glimpse.