Wet Hot American Mixtape

Five bands that embody some of the USA’s most iconic surf towns

- Justin Housman

I was in a bar the other night when somebody played the Pearl Jam song “Corduroy” from “Vitalogy” on the jukebox. The rollicking guitar and raspy vocals instantly catapulted me back to high school in Morro Bay, California, when I listened to that song every single day before surfing the Rock after class; in hindsight, that whole chunk of my life seems to be wrapped up in the four minutes of that song. Strangely enough, after moving to San Diego a few years later, I couldn’t stand the sound of Pearl Jam. Instead, I listened to nothing but Modest Mouse, which to this day makes me think of surfing weird reefs in La Jolla before toweling off for my shift at Sammy’s Woodfired Pizza. These song-to-surf-life pairings made me think: Sometimes a particular band’s sound embodies a certain surf town at a certain time. The kind of surf on offer, the weather, the locals, the cities themselves — all that gets tossed into a bubbling cultural stew and the result is a vibe that can be perfectly encapsulated by one, and only one, band.

With that in mind, I decided to put together a mixtape, if you will, that truly represents some of America’s iconic surf enclaves. For better or for worse.

Santa Cruz, California: The Grateful Dead