Wave of Success

Surf’s too big and gnarly for me.

--The Surf Punks

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Kowabunga, El Nino! Gnarly or nearly gnarly--there’s been some serious surf this winter. If all that wood on the beach is not proof enough that the ocean has been busy in recent months, there’s a new surf movie out called “Surfer’s Point.”

A new surf band, Tribal Me, not only provides the soundtrack for the film but also makes its debut tonight at Java Joe’s in Ventura, where big brown waves of industrial-strength coffee will fuel the festivities.

The local Surfers Point is a popular spot at the end of Figueroa Street in Ventura near Seaside Park. “Surfer’s Point,” the movie, chronicles a September day almost six months ago when the Hurricane Nora-driven surf there was a booming 15 feet or so.

John Wisda, a Santa Paula-based guitarist, fin head and photographer, concocted the film, which may be seen regularly on Ventura Channel 6. Another surf film is in the works with footage from Jan. 30, or Big Friday, when the surf was 20 feet, or totally gnarly.

The surf band Tribal Me--Wisda and guitarist and piano player Tom Kwake--recorded the soundtrack in a basement. For the live show, Tribal Me will grow to a quintet, adding Sol Ramon on guitar and Dave Stewart and Neal Mashburn on drums.

According to Wisda, “The music is an attempt to bring the true spirit of surfing into music, and also to reach our tribal selves and take us out of our normal working lives. There will be lots of improvising.”

* Tribal Me at Java Joe’s, 2950 Johnson Drive, #125, Ventura, tonight at 8 p.m. Free. (805) 642-4332.

Back in those silly ‘60s, when even your parents thought they were cool, San Francisco was the site of a happening music scene with a lot of bands with funny names such as the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane and Country Joe & the Fish.

On Friday the 13th, a couple of survivors of those days will try to invoke flashbacks of “groovy” when they play the Ventura Theatre. Quicksilver, formerly Quicksilver Messenger Service, now led by original member Gary Duncan, will headline, and Peter Lewis of Moby Grape will open.

Moby Grape was one of the best Bay Area bands, even though members actually came from Los Angeles and Seattle. Tightly crafted psychedelic songs about “good dreams and things to make you happy” made the Grape the Next Big Thing. Unfortunately, it ended up a case of Whatever Happened to Those Guys?

Moby Grape’s self-titled debut album released in 1967 was one of the great albums of the ‘60s, if not all time. The record company tried a novel approach to promote the record by releasing five singles at once. This was the Titanic of marketing ploys and such a bumfuzzle, it was never tried again.

The band, meanwhile, disintegrated from every possible creative difference imaginable--drug use, disputes with managers and each other as well as scary road trips. One of the members was even committed to a hospital for six months after an ax incident in a New York hotel, which always looks bad on the resume.

Lewis, an original Grape and son of Academy Award-winning actress Loretta Young, is now a Santa Ynez-based solo artist. He will be joined by guitarist David West for his set and may do a few Grape songs. Lewis submitted to a brief grilling.

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The first Moby Grape album was great. What happened?

At that time, everybody was trying to sign us, and we went with Columbia because they already had the Byrds and Bob Dylan. But the label never allowed us to find our own audience. And all those singles was a major marketing mistake. The deejays didn’t know what to do with them at the time, and it was like we weren’t legitimate, but somehow contrived like the Dave Clark Five or something.

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What was it like?

We weren’t trying to be rock stars; we were more interested in our live performances and were just trying to make it from one gig to another. We were just a rock quintet doing tight, rock-based arrangements. No one could do what we did on stage. But we really didn’t even know each other. It was like a Fellini movie where your life is interrupted with these hour-and-a-half shows. It was a very existential trip.

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So now what?

I’m a solo artist these days. I’m working on a new album that should be out in a few months on a German label. As for the band, we play a little bit together once in a while, usually with three of the original guys. But when we come together, it’s like reaching critical mass again, and after all those experiences, that journey through the past all starts to come back. You’ve got to face the devil within you if you don’t want him to drive the boat.

* Quicksilver and Peter Lewis at the Ventura Theatre, Friday at 9 p.m. $13. Call: 653-0721.