You don’t really know what to expect from a band who’s name is Surfer Blood – it sounds a bit of a messy situation really.  Are they going to be sinister, something along the lines of a doom rock band, dark and slightly evil, or is it going to be like listening to a Beach Boys tribute act…?  The name itself conjures all sorts of ugly images.

Having first seen Surfer Blood supporting The Drums some time ago, and having heard their debut LP Astro Coast (released in Summer 2010) I was well prepared for what lay in store musically.  And it was nothing so exciting really.  More of that middle of the road, semi-surf-rock influenced indie that’s being thrown around, and even though I hate the word quirky, that’s the best way to describe it; quirky indie pop.

Meeting the lads before their support slot with New York indie rockers Interpol was quite an experience.  Like being rocketed into an episode of Beavis & Butthead.  Sat in a dressing room with sniggering boys and their equally sniggery friends wasn’t what I was I was expecting.  Talk about making a girl nervous…

It seemed like JP Pitts was the most eager to talk.  Well not necessarily eager, but the one with the singing voice so he got the interviewee role as well.  Bless.  The rest kind of mooched about the dressing room, each with a laptop, making random comments and being cajoled into responding by him.  I could see that this was going to be fun for all of us.

So, onto Beardrock…

You’re supporting Interpol, big band and a big step up for you since you toured with The Drums:

JP: Yeah it is I guess, well this is all down to the good graces of Interpol, they must have heard about us from a friend or the internet or something, and they liked it enough to invite us to come with them so we’re really grateful that those guys are having us along.  Yeah we couldn’t sell out the Apollo on our own, we need a little help.  But we had no relation to them at all, well other than we used to cover Interpol in our school band, but yeah it is really neat for us to be touring with a band that we all grew up admiring.

How did you manage to bag this tour then?

I guess we’ve got this with a lot of hard work and a lot of good luck, we’re lucky that the album has been well received both at home and here in the UK and its slowly starting to spread around more and more.  We’ve done a lot of touring, we toured the US for two and a half months after the record came out, just relentlessly, with shows pretty much every night so that was really gruelling.  Then we came over here, and did a month in the UK and Europe, somehow we managed to get on at festivals like Reading and Leeds and in the US too, so hopefully that’s all helped people to find out who we are.  Other than that I don’t know, I guess we’re just blessed really,  its been a really crazy year for us really, a lot of touring and a lot of promo, and just pure hard work.  We’ve been making memories.

We actually did a tour one off date here in Manchester with The Drums after we’d toured with them in the US, well those guys are friends of ours, we’ve known them a while now, we ended up hanging out with them the other night in Dublin which was a lot of fun.  But anyway, it really wasn’t this cold last time we were here in the UK, I’ve never seen snow like this to be honest.  Well maybe I have, but very rarely, being from Florida, it’s cold, and it’s really cold in the van.  We have this van that we travel in which isn’t insulated and it’s really hard to sleep.  We get condensation on the inside of it.

Something that has popped up in various pieces about the band is a similarity to Weezer.  It’s a bit puzzling as I don’t think you really sound like them at all?

JP: Weezer are more goofy and powerful, they write really powerful songs especially on their first two records, but I think we all grew up listening to them and when we were young we were all listening to Weezer - The Blue Album weren’t we? [chorus of “yes” from around the room] songs like Say It Ain’t So, I was for sure.  I think that was actually a label that was put on us really early on and I don’t know why.  In really early reviews, and when journalists don’t look at what goes into our music they just Google Surfer Blood now and go “oh they sound like Weezer” and take it from there.  I mean it could be a lot worse, there are some pretty terrible bands out there, and Weezer are pretty good, but it’d be nice to be listened to properly.

So who or what does influence what you do then, other than listening to that album, things in life, experiences etc?

JP: What influences us? [to the room]

[TS & MM decide they can’t cope and leave the room, giggling]

JP: I think being an outcast at school always spurred me on

KW: Yeah being bullied at school, never getting any chicks, I started playing music to get girls.

JP: We tried sports for a while but that didn’t really work out, because none of us were very good so we all decided we were going to do music instead.

KW: I was never able to skateboard well enough.

MM [returned]: Three quarters of the band are still virgins though [laughs] that’s a true fact, so I don’t know whether it’s worked out or not.

JP: That’s not by choice.  No it IS by choice, we’re waiting for the right girl… if you’re lucky I’ll find you on Facebook haha!

I might deny that request, thanks.

You’re looking forward to the rest of the tour then, now you’re ‘out there’…?

JP: Yeah, we’ve got quite a few dates left, Liverpole is that how you say it? [corrected] oh right, Liverpool.   I’m just joking I know it.  Well then we have three dates in London which is great.  Interpol are going back to the US after those but we’re staying in London and playing a show at a venue called The Barfly, our own headlining show, no grown ups allowed haha!  After that, we’re off to New York for a few days to hang out with some friends then back to Florida to start recording some new stuff.  So that will be album number two or EP number one, we’ll have to see, it could be anything at the moment.

That’ll be about the tour and all these girls you’re going to find then, right?

JP: I know yeah, the trials and tribulations of being in a band.  In fact that’s what we’re going to call the next release, ‘Trials and Tribulations’ ha.

MM: ‘When buying gel becomes a luxury’.

JP: You don’t even know how hard it is for a young band these days, honestly, with the economy taking a plunge and people not buying records or coming to concerts any more, its not easy when people can see the band on YouTube or download stuff off the internet.  It’s not easy for us, and we can’t just give our music away, well that’s what I’ve always said.

Do you get a lot of support from your label [Kanine Records]?

JP: Oh yeah we get loads of support.  They’re a husband and wife duo from Brooklyn.

KW: Soon to be trio!

JP: Yeah! They have a little bun in the oven if you know what I mean.  But they’ve been very nice, they’ve been with us right from the beginning they’re very good people.  I have no doubt whatsoever that they have our best interests at heart.  Fuck major labels we’ll never sign to one, right [looks to rest of band for agreement, greeted with laughter] well what have I always said is, I don’t care too much for money ‘cause money can’t buy me love.  I’m saying that in preparation for us going to Liverpool tomorrow, that’s obviously not me talking it’s The Beatles.

I know that.

Anyway, enough of the giggling lads, now for the serious questions....

If there was anything you could tell your fans to do today what would it be?

KW: Stay in school. What was the other thing, what was that saying “give up on your dreams and follow your destiny”?

MM: No, “don’t follow your dreams follow your destiny”.

TF: I’d say “feel it rather than force it”.

JP: Drop out of college and start up a dot come empire.

KW: Yeah all the money is in social networking.

[more laughter, this time uncontrollable]

So some of you are going for faith and destiny and some of you are going for internet networking. Interesting…

Which famous beards do you admire?

JP: Doug March.

KW: Beard from ZZ Top who actually has no beard, the only one in the band without a beard but he’s called Beard, I think that’s pretty cool.

MM: I think Jesus had a great beard…

TF: I bet he got chicks haha…

JP: There are so many people throughout history who had great beards, Ghengis Khan had a beard, Socrates had a beard.

MM: Captain Blackbeard.

JP: Nostradamus.  These are all famous beards who we look up to, honestly.

MM: What about Frank Zappa, he’s one of my favourites, or was he more of a moustache?

KW: Brian Wilson, he had an awesome beard at one point.

JP: Merlin, I just wanna throw him in there.

MM: I was going to say Gandalf.

TS: What about Dumbledore? Even JK Rowling has a sick beard…

[descends into giggles]

See the lads in March 2011 at these potentially hirsute-friendly venues:

2 – Manchester,  Academy 3

3 – Birmingham,  O2 Academy 2

4 – Dublin,  O2 Academy

5  - Glasgow,  King Tuts

6 – Newcastle,  O2 Academy 2

8 – Brighton,  Digital

9 – London,  Scala