Pursuing freedoms

Returning to Costa Mesa’s Westside to record their first album in a few years gave the members of vintage Orange County punk band TSOL a nostalgic feeling.

It was like coming full circle for the band that frequented the now-defunct Cuckoo’s Nest nightclub on the Westside 30 years ago before rising to national fame and notoriety both for their trend-blazing music and their wild lifestyle rife with the substance-abuse problems and in-fighting that plague many bands.

“Doing it here was completely different. It kind of felt like when we first started recording — friends dropping in, close to the beach, in a warehouse,” said the band’s lead singer Jack Grisham, who still lives in Huntington Beach, while the rest of the members have moved to the four corners of the country.

Decades ago, while the band’s popularity was growing exponentially, another movement was on the rise in Costa Mesa: the surf industry. Luminaries of companies such as Billabong and Quiksilver that would later see an explosion in their businesses both in California and overseas filled the neighborhood.

It was at this time that Bob Hurley — who later founded Hurley International — met Grisham. Both were young surfers in Huntington Beach, which was then a small town where everyone who was part of the surf culture knew everyone else.

Hurley went to the Cuckoo’s Nest to see the band play.

“It was the only place around here where we could play. A lot of places wouldn’t let guys like us play there,” Grisham said.

The two men reunited for a weeklong recording session at the end of December to produce TSOL’s (short for True Sounds of Liberty) latest release, “Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Free Downloads,” at the recording studio that Hurley International set up in one of its warehouses.

The company recorded the album free of charge for the band, and it was released to the public free to download off Hurley International’s website, Hurley.com. It’s a strategy similar to that employed most famously by British band Radiohead in 2007 with one difference — any money fans choose to pay goes 100% toward a list of charities, not the band.

Hurley, for its part, gets the publicity from having the iconic group’s music on its website, and the band — all the members of whom now have day jobs — get to record again without worrying about a pricey record deal. It’s a model that Hurley executives think will be a big part of the future of recorded music, which is why they built a recording studio in the first place (not exactly a commonplace thing for a surf clothing company to have).

“The music industry is changing with the times in the world today, and the kids are holding the key to the car,” said Hurley Senior Vice President Paul Gomez.

With younger generations buying individual songs (or downloading them free) it’s harder to make a traditional record contract lucrative, Gomez said. In addition to putting the album online, Hurley put live video feeds of the weeklong, raw recording session on its website, which company spokeswoman Nicole Valles said was watched by about 10,000 to 15,000 unique viewers.

As for Grisham, he’s now what he calls a “baby sitter” for a living, following rich businessmen around the country and helping them with addiction problems. He still loves recording and performing when he gets a chance, but he says it was a lot more exciting back in his younger days in Costa Mesa and Huntington Beach.

Now, a kid will run by the stage where he’s performing, draped in a flag on fire and he’ll hardly bat an eyelash, Grisham recalled.

“Old men have been in so many fights that they’re just calm about everything,” he said.

TRUE SOUNDS OF LIBERTY

 TSOL formed in 1979 in Huntington Beach

 Since 1981 they have recorded 15 albums

 The musicians — lead vocals, Jack Grisham; guitarist, Ron Emory; bassist, Mike Roche; keyboardist Greg Kuehn and Tiny Bubs — all have day jobs.

 To this day, one of the band’s most famous albums is the 1981 “Dance with Me,” that had themes drawn from the horror genre.

ALAN BLANK may be reached at (714) 966-4623 or at alan.blank@latimes.com.