Friends of the Devil

In 1995, the Pilgrims followed up their debut with back-to-back albums, Estrus's Soul Pilgrim and eMpTy's At Home With Satan's Pilgrims. Two years later, the group's third full-length, Around the World With Satan's Pilgrims, hit stores. Sporting a handful of Pilgrims originals, as well as creative takes on Davie Allan's "The Fountain" and the Ree Gents' "Downshiftin'," Around the World was a stellar piece of instrumental magic for the reverb-impaired. Unfortunately, it was also one of roughly three billion pseudo-surf offerings to break in 1997, a year the aforementioned Phantom Surfers affectionately dubbed "the great surf crash of 1997" on an album of the same title. As a result, the platter went largely ignored. Needless to say, Scott wasn't entirely pleased with that less-than-monumental period in rock history. "I love playing the music," he confesses, "but to tell you the truth, I don't listen to as many of the new bands as I should. There's probably 95 percent of it that I don't pay attention to at all. I don't know, maybe they feel the same way about us. Maybe that's why we don't sell more records. But I just feel like we're more on the right track than they are."

Time will tell. Thus far, the Pilgrims appear to have survived the onslaught intact. In fact, the band's fourth effort, 1998's Creature Feature, was its most critically acclaimed yet, and Satan's Pilgrims are already creating a stir among the genre's fanatics. In addition, the quartet has just released a collection of monophonic garage-rock standards under the pseudonym the Chimps. Entitled Live at the Safari Club, the record is arguably the band's most controversial, in large part because it features (gasp!) vocals.

But that's not to say the band is ready to throw out their well-worn copies of "Wipeout" just yet. On the contrary, Scott reports that Satan's Pilgrims are alive and well and eager to take their new material on the road. At present, the group is in the midst of a brief jaunt with Deadbolt, the San Diego surf-doom act that proudly touts itself as the "world's scariest band." Such associations could well fuel the confusion surrounding the Pilgrims' sinister appellation even further. But the guitarist doesn't really seem to mind. In his words, "If people want to be a little bit afraid of us, that's okay."

Satan's Pilgrims, with Deadbolt and the Sinshakers. 9 p.m. Thursday, July 22, 15th Street Tavern, $6, 303-293-8003.