INSECT SURFERS - REVIEWS

Noize-y Joys - Find a new scene, or reconnect with an old one, through these must-see local bands

Guitarist David Arnson is another character I meet in the desert occasionally, but never with axe in hand. A pity, since there's plenty of room in the mudsprawl-art festival circuit for Insect Surfers' techno-hodad aesthetic. A charmingly wonky extension of the Ventures/Surfaris classic surf-rock into offhand sci-fi, this music is goofy-foot carving into a pink pipeline swelling off a blue powder shore amid the floating ruins of the Venice pier. Billed as "Planet Earth's longest-running modern surf band," the Surfers were formed by Arnson in Bethesda, Maryland, in the spring of 1979; its output was gobbled up excitedly by the style-omnivorous new wave before Insect Dave moved here in 1986 and reformed the band as an instrumental act. Satellite Beach, a 2004 compilation of the Surfers' L.A. years, is all the rectified-Owsley reverb, fuzz, and wah-wah of the late-1960s Sunset Strip soaked into an old copy of Famous Monsters of Filmland. Cut into single portions and serve.

by Ron Garmon, Best Of L.A. 2006 from City Beat Magazine

The Insect Surfers are being sponsored by Body Glove.