The Surlys play the kind of rock n roll that is filled with punk energy that will keep you coming back for more.
One listen to the new CD released ealier this year is proof of the quality music that the power trio put together.  
I was hooked. Great riffs, solid beat and hooks that are infectious.  

The Surlys hail from the Austin music scene in Texas and were formed in 2013 that include Beky Hayes on lead vocals
and bass, RC Hernandez on guitar and Kevin White on drums.  Not only are they filled with quality music but with plenty
of enthusiasm and talk about their music.

 

The Surlys, Hayes says, took the name because "We have surley attitudes. The name was inspired by legendary female pirates."
I’d also have to say that my personal highlights have been the shows where we played with legendary rockers like Cheetah Chrome from the Dead Boys, Texacala Jones from Tex and the Horseheads, and Kathy Valentine from The GoGos. Both Kathy and Tex live in Austin now and they each have great bands here. Tex’s band is called Hey and Kathy rocks it out as a guitarist
for The Bluebonnets, whom we played with very recently."
  
The band met up in 2013 when Hernandez and Hayes frequented the legendary punk club the Swan in Austin and the idea was
unstoppable.  "I think we saw eye-to-eye on a void in the local
music scene: there were hardly any straight-up Rock and Roll bands, with the old-school combination of catchy songs and dirty attitude," said Hays. "Beky and I are fans of the Austin music scene and we met at a bar that was like Austin’s version of CBGBs, The White Swan, said Hernandez.  We had a mutual friend who introduced us and we hit it off. We liked a lot
of the same music and shared similar ideas about the kind of band we were looking for. We decided to jam the next day and we wrote a couple songs pretty easily. Bek’s groovy style of bass playing sounded great on top of my power-chord guitar lines, so we decided to start a band. We were going
to be an all-girl band up until 2 weeks before our first show. Our drummer had to drop out of the band. Thankfully, we had met up with Kevin while out in the clubs shortly before. Kevin is well-known here on the Austin rock scene and he has played in some great local bands, so it was exciting to get him in to take over on drums. He adds a lot of power to our sound and got us a fair
amount of respect in our humble beginnings."

With one album in hand the band is already working on a new project.  
Hays said, "We have about half of our next album written. I would really like to find a cool producer/engineer to help us break our own glass ceiling. Oh and we need to make some new merch. If anybody wants to do a T-shirt design for us, we would feel the love."
Hernandez said, "We have a number of awesome shows lined up and we plan to get a You Tube Channel going before long. We’re also looking into filming a video or two for the current album. Hopefully, we will start hitting the Texas roadways in support of the album in a month or two."

The Surlys have become a major part of the Austin music scene which has gained a reputation as one of the best in the world.  "Austin Rocks!, said Hayes, I love living in a rock and roll town, and I’m grateful for the good treatment the Surlys have got from the clubs and the crowds. Nay-sayers have some valid points, things have Changed and they always will. The City is trying to address sustainability for the Live Music Capital, and the clubs could do more to make people comfortable, offer more than just booze, make it easier
for bands to function – like with band parking, designated merch tables, and better lighting that doesn’t give people seizures. I go out to live shows every week, but I’d go out more if it didn’t always give me a headache. There is a glut of bands, which some people blame for the “bookers market” (as
opposed to a players market where it would be easier for musicians to get paid). But this is still the most rock and roll town I’ve ever seen; there are tons of good bands in Austin, in every genre – any attempt to start naming names would cause a landslide, so I’ll just say please go out and see some bands, you can preview them online, and if you like them then say so! – join their social media pages, blah blah. Buy their shirts, for shit sake, bands are selling their local-made shirts with original artwork for less than you can get a new shirt at some crappy store. So help out the bands. And listen to local radio – we have KOOP and KAOS radio online, supporting local music every day. These things keep it all alive."  Hernandez added, "Bek is right, Austin really does ROCK. There are so many venues all over town and music festivals. The city of Austin does quite a bit to try and encourage and support the musicians that help to make this the Live Music Capital of the World. There is even a non-profit group that provides mental health and medical care for musicians who can’t afford insurance (Health Alliance for Austin Musicians)."

"Our music is punk-influenced, but there’s also a touch of glam rock, said Hernandez. We get compared to The Runaways a lot, but I’m not sure if that is just because we are girl-fronted. I’d have to say our music is driving, yet danceable with snarky lyrics that you can pump a fist to."  Hayes said, "Catchy, crunchy, Old-School Punk-Spawned Rock to beat on your hang-ups."
I don’t know how to describe us without using clichés I’d rather smash with a brick, but last night after our show at the Lost Well, a respected rock musician told me that we are his favorite band, that we are kind of “a wonder”( like the Seven Wonders of the World, or Wonder Woman, or the Wonder
Bra). That comment inspired me to keep going."

 

"As a band, I think we’ve definitely found a good chemistry that works, says Hernandez. My style of guitar-playing allows a lot of freedom for Bek to lay down some great bass lines. Kevin provides the dynamics that
take our changes to the next level of overdrive. I think it all really comes across well live and many people have told us this. I think the chemistry comes across visually, too. We choose to enhance that a little more by dressing alike for shows."

 

Hayes felt more compelled to start playin rock music as opposed to being inspired.   She said, "I feel more compelled than inspired. It’s like asking what makes a puppy run; a puppy just can’t sit still. There was always a piano in the house. I started banging on it when I was around four. Played different instruments in school, got into college on a music major audition. Rock and punk creeped in gradually. I remember my first rock concert in a park in Brockton, Mass, when I was five or six. I saw a band called Dale and the Duds, and fell in love with the gum-chewing, swaggering lead singer. That planted the seed that was fertilized by 70s soul, funk, acid rock, punk and metal -- back when real live DJs played great music on the radio… I have to give them credit, and lament their demise. For a while I was misguided by jazz fusion and a number of music teachers who did nothing to inspire me. After one year of music college bullshit I dropped out and started rocking. My first club gig was with an all-girl metal band that had an ad in the newspaper (the paper kind) for a female bass player. I had just acquired my first bass from an ex who owed me money. I guess hanging around other musicians,
especially guys, and thinking “I could do that, better than that” was what lit my fire. A competitive, rebellious spark; I wanted to do it my way. Rock-wise, my biggest inspiration is John Lydon, for his ability and courage to go from the Sex Pistols to PIL (both of which I freekin love). Iggy Pop was equally life-saving in a god-like way. Funkadelic, Black Sabbath, Motorhead, David Bowie, the
Ramones, the Buzzcocks, the Misfits, and a hundred others..."
Hernandez came from a muiscal familhy.  "Everyone in my family was into music. I remember my mother coming home from work and playing her Elvis Presley albums very loud. She and my father grew up in the 1950s and
rocked out to classic 45 records while hanging out in a friend’s garage, so I never had to worry about my parents not liking my music. They were very supportive. My mother actually bought my first guitars. My older brother is the one who turned me towards a harder rock sound as I got older. He listened to Kiss, Aerosmith, David Bowie, Queen and countless others. I would sit
outside his bedroom door while he played his records. Sometimes, he’d let me in and I’d just listen."

 

In addition to the heat of Austin and lots of gear to carry that can dwarf the girls, they overcome all  with a true passion inside that keeps the Surleys moving forward and getting better.  They quiet all critics with there play and professionalism.   Hays said, "Well there’s always the obvious cliché, the assumption that girls can’t really rock… When we get on stage, they’re not gonna believe how hard we rock our azz off, ninja. We get sweaty-nasty-ugly --well not RC, she just gets more shiny – and I’m sure some people don’t expect this skinny little chick with the guitar to actually rip some leads and keep good rhythm and step on the right pedals all whilestriking a surly rock-out pose!"  They might see our album cover and think, who are these goofy broads, it’s probably the same old mediocre stuff (for whatever preconceived reasons) etc. After finally listening to the record, people have come at me with sort of amazed reactions, like they didn’t expect us to put any work into the
songs or play our instruments worth a crap, or be able to conceive and produce something good. I’m not saying it’s sooooo great, just better than the average person would expect. I say this because my own expectations for myself are so high, my work is never good enough for me, but then I’m kind of
blown away by the feedback we get. I think people tend to overlook the crafty details, like if their ear is inclined to a certain style of punk rock or stoner rock, etc., they might think our songs are just simple crowd-pleasing retro-rock, and not appreciate the little hooks in the structure, the sarcasm in the lyrics, stuff like that. They might assume that our songs would be vapid, shallow, only concerned with “girl stuff” like so many pop divas or whatever they’re called. I would guess that people underestimate the humor, and the darkness…
Hernandez added, "We are often referred to as a girl band due to Bek and I being front and center, but our drummer is a guy and so we often have to remind people of that fact. Kevin is great about it though, he rolls with it. He usually has a good wisecrack comeback for people who call us a chick band. As for the music, surprisingly in this day and age, we still get people who do not expect us to be any good before they see us play. I think that sometimes the songs can get lost in the shock factor that hits some of those particular audience members. On the opposite end of things, people can also be VERY
supportive of us because we are fronted by girls."

 

The band released a hot 9 song self-titled CD which features a great collection of fired up rock and punk.  Hayes said, "being invited to record with some great rock musicians was a huge honor for me. Gian Ortiz was starting up a recording studio, and after seeing our first show, his brother Chris invited
us to record with them. We didn’t have to worry about a big budget or being crammed for time –although as it turned out, I would have spent another couple weeks in the studio “producing” the crap out of it with all my hare-brained ideas… like adding a “slap track” – an extra percussion track on “Girl
Next Door” where we put a towel over a snare drum, added some effects, and got Chris to sit there and smack it on the 2 and 4 beats. I feel like it added the swanky swing I heard in my head when we came up with the song. Experimenting with extra vocal tracks added substance too, I thought – like at
the end of “Queen” (which we changed for the live version after we finished the record), and Kevin’s monologue at the end of 12 th and Chicon. RC’s rhythm and lead guitar work obviously filled out the songs like we’d never heard them before. I know if she’d had more time to prepare she would have
done even greater things. She worked hard on some backup vocals that kind of got lost in the mix. But possibly the biggest tragedy of the recording was losing the car horn beep on “12 th and Chicon” that brother James Ortiz helped us with. We wanted some street noise. Jim miked up under his hood and hit the horn at the right time. It was a fun shock, in the middle of the song. But then during the mixing process the track got erased. It’s amazing what Gian was able to do with only 8 tracks. The cover art was loads of fun too – just ask RC about the swarm of ticks in the field where I made her crawl in the sewer tunnel for the zombie photo shoot! We have to thank our friends Larry Stern and Jerry Morgan for their help on the CD cover art. Larry came out for two different photo shoots, for the Zombie Surlys and the Secret Agent Surlys. Larry has been photo-documenting the Austin music scene for years. We worked together on Rank and Revue magazine. Jerry’s design work helped execute my concept of us defeating our bad selves!"    Hernadez said, "The album is our 9 song self-titled debut that we recorded with a talented up-and-coming studio master, Gian Ortiz. Gian is an amazing bassist who plays with his brothers in a blues rock trio called Amplified Heat. I feel Gian really captured who we are on this recording. One of my main worries when recording with anyone is that the band will lose its edge in the recording process, but I was really pleased to see that the final result we received from Gian stayed true to our hard-rock-with-a-dash-of-punk sound. I think overall, the CD has a little something for everyone. We have songs about teen angst, bad relationships, rebellion against the man, and everyday life in Austin,
Texas."

 

For Hayes and Hernandez, forming the Surlys had greater meaning than just performing in a band.  It is the opportunity to overcome life with true passion and feeling and work towards a common goal.  "A legitimate excuse to not act my age… It’s fun, ya know, being loud and acting a fool in public --and getting paid for it, rather than getting kicked out, said Hayes. And it’s kind of a surrogate family, when you don’t have any family around. And it’s a challenge, even a burden -- to constantly one-up myself. But the real experience has been a validation. I’ve played music all my life, but the Surlys is like my first
time putting my real self out there. Being a writer and lead singer has brought me out of the “background actor” status of being just a bass player. It’s more pressure, for sure. A bigger challenge.  It’s also been a validation in the local music scene (for what it’s worth, a little story). A few years back
I put out a rock magazine called Whoopsy (in partnership with the brilliant and total badass Chad Holt) that took the piss out of local bands and stacked up some hate mail. As an anti-scene, devil’s advocate type of reviewer, I was misunderstood a lot, maybe seen as a “hater” even though I squandered all my time supporting local music. Readers could have justifiably asked, what right does she have to talk, what has she ever done? I think there’s more respect for critics who know what they’re talking about because they’ve done it. Anyway, people I’ve known for years through that scene have recently told
me they had no idea I played in a band, or no idea I was such a “badass bass player” (thanks guyshaha)."
"This band represents a new beginning for me, said Hernandez. I had come out of a huge slump in my life. I’d dealt with a lot of personal loss, ill health and had actually not played music for several years. The
opportunity to play in The Surlys was just the spark that I needed to get myself going again. Rocking out on the guitar in a band for an audience has always been my foundation in life. The energy from the audience and the music just doesn’t compare to anything else."

Get your ears on the bands CD and feel the energy the Surlys propel with a great vibe.  They are well worth  your time and one of the hottest acts you will find.  Yes, these girls know how to rock and White keeps the beat that is the perfect mix behind the guitar and bass and backed with a rock solid beat on the drums.

Together they have a sound that will rock your soul and keep you coming back for more.  The Surlys Rock with Attitude!   

 

 

https://www.facebook.com/Surlys