from the beach

Our fall will sound like summer. Not everyone’s but certainly indie rock’s, and three bands (a trend) — the Drums, Girls and Beach Fossils — will be partially responsible. Some of their music will remind you of surf rock. More of it like the electrified cicadas of early R.E.M. Most of it like California. And all of it blissful and innocent and gaudily young.

The Drums come from Brooklyn, and the big indie labels are currently in pursuit (it’s almost an infestation round these parts). They are fey, freshly awkward, and beautiful, their skin glistening with that “born in the past 22 years” sheen. The music is similar in every way. It’s emotional, fearless, and spends every Tuesday night having life moments at Lit hours after you went home because, ya know, “work tomorrow.”

“Let’s Go Surfing” is the Drums’ best song, and it’s no joke. Second listen and you know that this is a classic for all surf videos from now until eternity, but maybe a classic for everyone, too. Even better with the video:

Sure, first ten seconds you’re writing it off as a Bat for Lashes rip-off but then you get over yourself and just take it in, this lanky, ’50s queer pinup handsome boy jogging and singing his song, and then:

And you are just hooked. The weird burping guitar line, the whistle that will reel people in with the “is that Peter, Bjorn an…” gag, and finally, in a tie, that chorus and middle-eight, so perfectly effortless.

(Epilogue: The drunk girls who will love love love this song will call it “The Obama Song” when they request it from the DJ.)(I’ve come close to talking myself into thinking that’s what he really says sometimes.)

Beach Fossils I know nothing about except that I went to see Girls and Kurt Vile only to leave thinking that Beach Fossils, the no-name opener, played the best show I had seen that night (the clip above is from that). It’s jangly with a hint of that chooglin’ feeling that John Fogerty gets every time he eats too many oysters. It reminds me of Pavement, too, but I can’t explain why.

The vocals are not great. They are warped and warbling: over the course of a song or two it sounds awesome but over a full set (which is the case) not so much. But “Vacation” and “Daydream” feel too much like perfect early Galaxie 500: nerdy and awkward and high as fuck. (And the beach thing goes past the name: this is music for going to an awesome clambake where everyone brought amazing casseroles and booze and you only brought chips and a six-pack but hey, who cares, life is easy, let’s play Trivial Pursuit and smile through our sunglasses.)


The band is currently unsigned and soon to be trendy. Love them anyway.

Before I get into our last band lemme mention a handful of almosts: Real Estate. Vivian Girls if I liked them. Kurt Vile has his beach-y moments. And the Desolation Wilderness record is very apt (try “Satellite Song“). Still, no one compares to Girls:

That’s “Hellhole Ratrace” by Girls, a song that lead off our own Selected + Collected compilation, in the video above. It’s the best song on their upcoming record, Album (out September 8 ) in a four-way tie with “Lust for Life,” “Ghostmouth” and “Summertime.”

“Summertime” is just tremendous; it’s a crime that the world has not had it these past three months. Nothing but bass, clanging guitar and Christopher Owen swaggering in his surly 14-year-old way. Lyrics like “Lay in the park/ Smoke in the dark/ Get high like I used to do/ Summertime/ Soak up the sunshine with you” that make your knees buckle and your eyes mist at how goddamn simple it used to be.

You keep waiting for the song to erupt but, like “Hellhole Ratrace,” it never quite does. It just becomes more ornate and gilded, but never sharp. Girls are too delicate for such a thing, for their Album is something much bigger than an indie record. It is an ethos to life done easy, a conscious path to a new innocence, and I am sure that we will embrace it — along with these bands — this fall.

Until we all turn on them like jackals, anyway.