Les Tigres du Futur have a sound unto themselves, yet familiar enough for the impact to be immediate. As much as this is a guitar-centric site, they mostly serve as the crunchy, grinding infantry force. Leading the charge is the whirlwind keyboard, which deftly straddles both psych/prog mystery and adventure and a hip-shaking mod beat. If that doesn't sound very surf, it's because it's not; I don't hear a shred of Dick Dale, Ventures or even Shadows in this -- MAYBE Davie Allan or Link Wray but only because I'm looking for it. It's instrumental rock & roll though, no arguing it.

The Coffin Daggers' self-titled LP was a mainstay on Storm Surge of Reverb back in the WESU days. It struck a really great balance between loud, thundering power and traditional surf sensibilities. As I've suggested about The Madeira's first record, it would be very difficult for them to ever dethrone that effort due to my impenetrable personal bias.

Mike Barbwire has been busy with rockabilly outfit The Dragtones for a bit, and while there have been some good n crunchy instrumental bits for us to enjoy there, it's his work with The Barbwires/Blue Ocean Orchestra that really make me lose control. The Barbwires' Searider is a desert island disc for me, and the subsequent 7"s have been just as frenzied, lush, and memorable. So here's another one!

The Aloha Sluts have a brand new 7" out on Tombstone Records Holland. It's got 4 songs on it and features some great-as-usual artwork from Shawn Dickinson. The only thing I've heard from it is from the preview below, but the rest of their material to date has been punchy and fun -- surfy enough for trad fans, but pretty loud too.

This debut 7" from the German Quartet Braindead Dogs makes me think: in instrumental music you can attach your music to any kind of imagery. So why not more food rock? This food rock 7" sounds a lot like trad surf with a bright and bouncy sound that I could imagine being pretty fun in a live setting.

I believe this is finding its way to an actual 7" record later, but for now you can grab it on bandcamp.

This one has actually been floating around as a vinyl and CD release for a few months now, but it wasn't clear to me where your average internet-surfin' joe could get it. That answer is now free on bandcamp.

This one has been available for streaming for a while, but like so many others their vinyl 10" got stuck in an enormous backlog. But the wait is over, and you can now spin these songs on your turntable. Balu & die Surfgrammeln have a pretty trad, upbeat surf sound interspersed with a lot of vintage audio clips. I love the bounce in "Der Zerfall Von Backerbsen" and the percussion in their version of Comanche.

And of course, gotta love that great Shawn Dickinson artwork.

You can order it from Green Cookie or through bandcamp.

13th Magic Skull's last record "Sungazing in Rapa Nui" was a huge surprise hit last year. I gave it an honorable mention for a Gremmy and definitely gave it a lot of thought for the big prize. They've just got so much punch that I'm always surprised when I give it another listen and hear a pretty pure surf sound.

The Exotics have two LPs under their belt: 1996's Go Go Guitars and 2009's The Lost Room as well as a few EPs. A retrospective album like this works in a time sense at over 20 years, but it's still pretty easy to pick up the complete collection too. Their bandcamp says this has a few new and remixed tracks, but I haven't figured out which ones those are.

Double Crown had been teasing a mystery EP in a few of their newsletters and I confess I had no clue. It turns out it was a new outfit with Sean Berry, Mr. Double Crown himself, in the lineup! He's joined by Jonny Browning of Jonny and the Shamen/MOAM and Hollis Pilling. It's a modest collection of songs, not terribly loud or aggressive, more quirky and creepy, but the MOAM lineage definitely comes through. Three of the tracks are originals, but I actually really like their take on the Ventures' VampCamp where they've sped it up to a less creepy tempo. Sounds like a new song!