The Growlers

Via Costa Mesa and down into the belly of Echo Park, The Growlers are the party band that grew into a traveling circus of psychedelia that influenced Burger and Lolipop Records and even spawned their own festival, Beach Goth. It's a zonked-out, uniquely Californian vision of bleached blond hair and drunkard culture that many bands have imitated but none have managed to reproduce. Lead singer Brooks Nielsen draws the kind of devotion among Growlers fans that Jim Morrison once did. And they've built their cult following without a single album review in Pitchfork.