Tommy Guerrero’s ‘Sunshine Radio’ is the latest release in his pretty consistent turnover of albums, with the skateboarding legend turned musician averaging at least an LP every three years since 1997’s ‘Loose Groove And Bastard Blues’, as well as slotting in other projects (check out last year’s ace Los Days).
On a similar path to his last album, 2018’s ‘Road to Knowhere’, we’re taken on a surf guitar led road-trip through Guerrero’s delightfully cool twist on beach funk, Ethio-Jazz, Afrobeat, Highlife and Spiritual Jazz. The mood is decidedly horizontal with the few diversions into more kinetic territory just nudging things up to the odd bout of hip-swaying and head nodding.
It’s built for dive bars, as on the Tarantino-esque surf-psyche grooves of ‘A Thousand Shapes Of Change’ and ‘Mysterious Frequencies’, excursions to desert meditation on ‘Descendent Of Memory’ and ‘Down Thru Light’, and any soundtrack to beach campfires at sunset.
Released in the darkest January in memory, ‘Sunshine Radio’ is a very welcome transmission of laid-back jams that transport the listener to sunnier climes and happier times.
Tommy Guerrero ‘Sunshine Radio’ is available now on his own label Too Good.
