I got the chance to sit down with the guys from Inlet on May 22nd and got to know the surf rock group from Ponce Inlet, Florida. After being there for about 60 seconds, I was already infatuated by the group's dynamic. The way they all feed off each other, joke around, and seem to really love one another. So many bands are putting on a show, but what you see is what you get with these guys. What you see are brothers John and Matthew Gray both playing guitar and singing, Jake Tweed on guitar, Luke Hampton on bass, and Aaron McKeown on drums. This likable five-piece band has already won the hearts of fans locally and is ready to take the internet by storm. They have already made their debut at Wills Pub, Delandapooza, Jack Rabbits, and Kona Skate Park.
Msm: What is your go-to karaoke song?
Jake: I'm not going to lie to you, I love singing Don't Stop Believing but I can't hit the notes, though.
Matthew: Your Love by The Outfield.
John: The last time I did karaoke, I tried to sing Man in a Box.
Msm: How has it been trying to navigate through a changing scene?
Luke: The Daytona scene is pretty dead, there is only a handful of bands, but we make it work by playing in Orlando and Jacksonville
Matthew: Agreed with Luke, but it is cool to see the same group of homies and people time and time again. That's a cool thing about having just a few tight bands.
MSM: Earliest memory surrounding music?
Matthew: Probably when I got an MP3 for Christmas and my dad put Revolver by the Beatles in it, which was the first time I ever paid attention to music
Luke: I also got an MP3 player when I was 5 or 6, and also got Revolver by the Beatles
John: I feel like the earliest music memory I have is watching In The Band on VH1 on Saturday morning.
Jake: I can't exactly pinpoint the moment, but I had a blue iPod shuffle that my dad used to burn songs into. The earliest would probably be my mom driving around playing Brittney Spears and Eminem on the CD player.
Aaron: Probably my dad putting on the darkness
Msm: What inspired the name Inlet?
John: ponce Inlet, I will give a little background me and Matt were trying to come up with different band names and we had a bunch of working ideas. The one that stuck out the most was Beach Rangers, but it seemed a little too much. It seemed too on brand, too narrow and too surf rock. I felt like inlet was good and it was big enough, it's also a homage to where we came from. We weren't going to name it Daytona
Msm: What's the writing lyric process like?
Matthew: John and I bounce back and forth writing lyrics. John writes, I’d say, about 70 percent of them.
John: I have songs and poetry on my phone or in a notebook but for the most part I will listen to a song first that we all creat like a riff, once that feels a little bit more complete I’ll kind of write on the spot and then record on a voice memo then work shop it from there.
Msm: If you could open for any artist, who would you open for?
Matthew: Mac DeMarco
John: The Strokes
Aaron: The Skegss
Jake: That's a hard one, probably like Knocked Loose, that might be too hard, maybe Flesh Water
Luke: I think it would be funny to open for Sexyy Red or something
Msm: Any local or underrated bands you’re listening to right now?
Aaron: Default Friends
John: a band Aaron put me on, The Skeggs. I feel like not a lot of people know the Skeggs. I also listen to Blind Purpose, Aaron's band.
Msm: If your music were a color, what color would it be?
Matthew: I'm going to say Baby Blue or Forest Gray
John: Seafoam Green
Luke: I get yellow
Jake: I can get with Yellow and green
Msm: I don't think I've had a group all pick different colors yet
Jake: I think that the reason we all perceive it as something different is because we are all ourselves. Our act is just us being literally us. We go home, and we are literally ourselves at home. I feel a lot of people in this scene, or just in general, get on stage and put on a persona, but when they get home, they're not like that. We are all just ourselves.
Luke: We get the full rainbow
Aaron: I chose purple!
Msm: What advice would you give your younger self?
John: If I could go back in time and talk to little John, I would say not to take anything personal. Everyone has something going on, and their opinions don't dictate who you are.
Matthew: I’m going to piggyback off of what John said that was good.
Luke: I don’t think my younger self would really take any advice, and I don't know if I'd really want it. I'm pretty happy with where I'm at.
Msm: What do you have coming up that you are looking forward to?
Matthew- we're working on getting an EP out soon and trying to play some shows.
John: We're in the process of writing an EP that we want to release by the end of summer. In the meantime, we're going to have an online presence, a lot of posting online, interacting with people online, so I want people to check that out
Luke: Branching out with some of the songs we've been writin,g and after the EP, I feel like we're gonna go towards a cool direction
Aaron: I’m excited just to hang it's always fun.
