GUANTANAMO BAYWATCH

Chest Crawl

guantanamobaywatch.com

Surf rock didn’t need Quentin Tarantino to make it sound badass. Long before Pulp Fiction, the genre’s best instrumentals paddled into pretty dark water, suggesting after-hours intrigue down at the shrimp shack. On its second album, the Portland trio Guantanamo Baywatch offers a particularly trashy take on this venerable ’60s sound, ripping trebly Ventures guitar runs with violent garage vigor. On tunes like “Barbacoa” and the title track, the trio hangs 10 amid B-movie sea monsters and tatted-up, gum-smacking mermaids. The demented malt-shop ballads “Sad Over You,” “Diana” and “Frizzella,” meanwhile, find sometime singer Jason Powell behind the mic, making like Dion possessed by demons. Dig the depravity, daddio.

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