Fans of indie rockers Surfer Blood packed House of TARG on Nov. 18 to watch the band play their first-ever Ottawa show.
Local band King’s Quest opened the show with songs from their latest album, Fox Island, before the headliners took the stage.
Opening the show with “Grand Inquisitor,” the lead track off their most recent album, 1,000 Palms, Surfer Blood set the tone for the rest of the show. A mix of songs including tracks from 2010’s Astro Coast and 2013’s Pythons, kept fans jamming out all night long.
The Charlatan sat down with frontman JP Pitts to talk about their latest album and touring with Nate Ruess.
The Charlatan (TC): So you mentioned this was your first time coming to Ottawa to play a show. What did you think?
JP Pitts (JP): You know, this venue is really awesome and I would definitely play here again. There’s like this very old classic vintage feel to it—a lot of classic pinball machines. We unfortunately haven’t had much time to explore the town. We hung out in Montreal last night with some friends and hung out all day, just made it in. There was a lot of people here and they all seemed really stoked and I think we’ll definitely be coming back.
TC: The next couple of dates of the tour you’re with Nate Ruess from fun. How did that come about?
JP: He asked us to play and we were really flattered that he even knew who our band was . . . He’s been really nice and his band and his crew have been really nice to us—everyone gets along and we get up in front of a lot of people who would never probably come to a Surfer Blood show. Which is, you know, for us a huge deal. So we’re happy to do it and it’s not the longest tour in the world but you know, he’s really nice and we’re grateful for the opportunity.
TC: You guys just released an album, 1,000 Palms, earlier this year. Is it different from what you’ve put out before?
JP: It is much different than what we’ve put out before. I think every single one of the records we put out is different from the last one. We’re constantly changing and trying new things, and this record I think is an especially pronounced departure because, you know, our second record we were on a major label and we were sort of writing more pop-formulated songs. And once we got dropped we realized that we didn’t really have to write any particular kind of song. So I think it’s our most diverse, dynamic record to date. It’s definitely a little all over the place but it was really, really refreshing to make a record like this after, you know, the ups and downs of the past five years, so it feels like the right place for us to be right now.
TC: Did anything specific inspire it?
JP: I moved to California recently and got very into hiking in Joshua Tree, and I was really inspired by how vast it is and how far apart everything is from each other and there are like these little oases called, like, 29 Palms, 49 Palms—they’re all really far apart from one another and mysterious. Driving around there at night it’s just, like, so eerie. And then I actually went to one of them and figured out what they are. It’s a place where two tectonic plates have met and ground water has come up and they’re these beautiful, lush areas with palm trees and all kinds of vegetation. It’s like a jungle but only for, you know, a few hundred square feet. Just based on me moving to a new place and feeling like I was starting over with the band in some ways it was a really nice sort of metaphor for what we were going through.
TC: All four of you went to high school together. Did you guys play together when you were in school?
JP: Yeah, we’ve all definitely jammed together . . . We’ve all been running in the same circles for years. You know, it’s been a rough year—we lost a guitarist and a bassist, and I’m so grateful that I’ve managed to make so many awesome friends along the way who are just really good musicians and easy people to be on the road with.
