Fungi Girls

In a modest suburb beyond Dallas, Texas, three adolescents who performed as Fungi Girls drew national notice through their surf-infused strain of detached garage punk long before any held a driver’s license. Bassist Deryck Barrera, guitarist and lead vocalist Jacob Bruce, and drummer and occasional singer Skylar Salinas formed the trio in summer 2008 after absorbing the lo-fi scuzz-pop of Times New Viking and Psychedelic Horseshit. Capturing their first demo on a digital camera’s built-in microphone and converting the results into heavily distorted MP3s, the band mirrored the blown-out production values of those influences. The recordings spread rapidly online, leading to a split 7" with Indian Wars and a cassette edition—later reissued on vinyl by Play Pinball Records—of the debut full-length Seafaring Pyramids.

Still dependent on rides from relatives, the group began performing farther from home and reached Austin, Texas, in 2011 for sets at Austin Psych Fest and South by Southwest. Several additional 7"s appeared before the release of Some Easy Magic on HoZac Records that same year. On this second album the teenagers moved away from the noisy lo-fi garage pop of earlier work and toward a more refined surf-garage hybrid that favored moody instrumental tension over bursts of youthful noise. A planned west coast tour in support was ultimately canceled for reasons that were never disclosed.