Since dropping their debut EP, Don’t Mind Me, Surrender The Ghost have been putting the scene on notice. Now, the band’s vocalist Ricky Gonzalez has joined TGEFM for the latest in our Roll of the Dice interview series. Check it out below and visit the band’s Linktree for all of their links.
Thank you so much for agreeing to this interview and congrats on signing with PNWK. What can you tell me about yourselves, your sound and what you want it to represent to your listeners?
We as a band are just a group of guys that are having a blast hanging out and playing music together. We are constantly making each other laugh and are thankful we get to perform on top of it. We’re always trying to bring the energy with our sound, both on and off the stage. We focus our lyrics to reflect the fact that we have grown a lot since we all first started playing and we’re thankful for the family and friends we have made along the way. We all have family that we are thankful for and love and we try to portray that through our music. We want to represent the fact that it’s never too late to make a dream come true.
As I mentioned, you recently signed to PNWK Records. What was it about the label that made you know they were the right fit?
We couldn’t be more thankful that PNWK wanted to partner with us. They caught our eye by the bands they were signing and the sound they were going for. We felt like we had a similar vibe but unique enough sound to hopefully be an addition, thankfully they agreed! We knew as soon as we hopped on a zoom meeting with them that we would make a great team and they have already been a huge part of helping us figure out our direction and goals. We are thankful for their faith in us as a “younger” band and we’re looking forward to growing together.
One of our obligatory questions in these interviews also tends to be the one I have found most important on a personal level. Who are some bands on your radar that TGEFM readers may not know about, but you think they should?
Some of our major influences are bands the readers may have heard of but we try to emulate our favorite parts of each band that we love; bands like The Wonder Years, Taking Back Sunday, Hot Mulligan, and Real Friends. Some lesser known bands we really enjoy as well are Saturdays at Your Place, Palette Knife, Good Hangs.
What’s next for Surrender The Ghost?
Up next for Surrender the Ghost is really focusing on our new EP and getting that completed and released. We also are working on playing as many shows as we can locally while growing our fanbase enough to take the leap on more shows out of town. We are always writing new music and trying to play with bands we love for people we love. We can’t wait to see what the next year has in store!
Was there anything I missed that you’d like to share or dive deeper into with our readers?
As a band we try to focus on adding positivity to the emo/pop punk music scene. We want the readers to know that we have all experienced pain but there is light on the other side of the tunnel. It’s never too late to grow and make a change.
Roll of the Dice is a short interview format with a variable amount of questions. A pair of dice is rolled and the total, between 2 and 12, is the amount of questions we can ask. All questions are given to the interviewee(s) at once, and no follow-ups are allowed. The interview may be lightly edited for content and clarity.
Bad Dad (occasionally called Ed) has been on the periphery of the punk and punk-adjacent scene for over twenty years. While many contributors to this site have musical experience and talent, Ed’s musical claim to fame comes from his time in arguably the most punk rock Blockbuster Video district in NJ where he worked alongside members of Blanks 77, Best Hit TV and Brian Fallon. He is more than just an awful father to his 2 daughters, he is also a dreadful husband, a subpar writer, a terrible dresser and has a severe deficiency in all things talent… but hey, at least he’s self-aware, amirite?
Check out the pathetic attempts at photography on his insta at https://www.instagram.com/bad_dad_photography/
