Despite my 15+ year long radio campaign, surf music has never caught on in New Orleans, and my chances to talk about a local group are rare. In fact, Gitkin is not surf. It's the sort of passport psych* similar to groups like Khruangbin, Glass Beams, and BALTHVS, and it's been working! Once a side project from Brian J Gitkin's role in Pimps of Joytime, Gitkin (as a musical entity) has become a bigger focus, with major festival spots and international tours.

I've heard of surf bands springing from many genres. PLENTY of punk-influenced surf bands, some from a jazz background, but I think traditional New Orleans style jazz is a first. 80% of JJ and the Trash Dogs are also members of Tuba Skinny, one of the most well-loved groups from that scene.

JJ and Trash Dogs are the newest New Orleans surf band, I believe with only 4 shows so far, two of which I attended and somehow missed the band. Arg.

New Orleans’ instro scene is a weird one but as of lately a surprisingly active one. We’ve seen releases from surf punks The Bills, the au naturale Quaketones and the unnatural Unnaturals in just the span of a few months.

After 4 years this New Orleans local surf punk band has put out their third release. Every Bills release has sounded better than the last, and this one lets you know it right from the first loud and heavy note of guitar. And they're proud of it; even though half of this album is vocal, the guitars are always just as loud.

The Quaketones caught me with my pants down. I had only heard about them a day before this poped up on bandcamp despite them being from New Orleans.

The Unnaturals have been showing New Orleanians what instrumental rock & roll is about since before I found my way to a local frequency, and we're lucky to have such a unique group stick around this long.

At this point I've been doing this radio show in New Orleans for about 5 years, and in that time very few listeners have come to the obvious conclusion that they should start a surf band. So I was overcharged with excitement when I was shown a youtube video from a frequent listener of their new band Ghost Coast. A few days later, there's even a demo up on bandcamp!

I like to think that I do a pretty good radio show, but having a surf radio show in New Orleans hasn't really started a movement or anything. I know of only 4-ish surf groups in Louisiana, and that's counting some of them as halves. One of those is Baton Rouge's Rondo Hatton (who I'm 99% sure formed with zero influence from my radio show).