From Jersey City to the Jersey Shore

Jersey City got a little taste of the Jersey shore last week when The Coffin Daggers stopped over to do a live performance on their way to the Asbury Park Surf Music Festival.
Peter Klarnet, the bass player for the band, said the band appeared at WMFU studios on Montgomery Street to preview a number of songs from their upcoming LP “Aggravatin’ Rhythms,” due to be released on Cleopatra Records in the fall.
“We played Joe Belock’s show,” he said. “We played many of the songs at both gigs.”
Sometimes mislabeled as a surf rock band, the New York instrumental rock band has been on the scene since 1999. Their previous release “Monsters from the ID” was inspired by 1960s music and was one of the featured songs at the live performance in Jersey City.
Along with Klarnet, the current make up of the band includes Viktor Venom on lead guitar and Theremin, Echoplex; Rob Morrison on keyboard, and rhythm guitar, and Pete Martinez on drums.
Although the band was featured at the Surf Festival held in Asbury Lanes on July 11, they are significantly more complex than punk or surf with influences from Dick Dale, Henry Mancini, Link Wray, the Cramps, and others.
Viktor Venom, who worked with Reagan Youth, and Chaos UK, started the group early in 1999.

A wide range of moods

The Coffin Daggers play music not typical of punk or surf music, often creating mood swings that go from melancholic to outrageous. In some of their more complex arrangements, they seem almost classical in structure, often letting whole passages of chords linger in the air. But the band also rocks out, often rivaling head-banging metal for intensity. One critic called their music surf punk with a psychedelic twist.
Venom said the lack of lyrics to their music translated well during European tours where people could listen and get the music without struggling to understand what was being said.

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“We played Joe Belock’s show. We played many of the songs at both gigs.” – Peter Klarnet
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A veteran of the punk music movement, Venom was living in Holland when he saw a performance by Dick Dale, a guitar eccentric widely regarded as the godfather of surf music. Venom said the experience caused a profound change in his music. More than a little ironically, The Coffin Daggers are slated to play with Dick Dale at the Wonder Bar in Asbury Park on Aug. 8.
In an pre-surf festival interview, Venom also said his music is strongly influenced by music from classic TV shows such as “Get Smart,” “Batman,” “Star Trek” and “the Munsters.”
The band appeared in Jersey City on July 6 and played a full set of songs, many from the upcoming album, almost as a warm up for the show in Asbury Lanes a week later.
The name of the band came from a reference in Bobby Pickett’s 1960s hit, “Monster Mash.” A coffin dagger is also a small knife used to assassinate people close up.

Al Sullivan may be reached at asullivan@hudsonreporter.com.