Young Mammals

No one knows summer like Santa Monica's Zach Yudin, a man of leisure who recognizes "the epic" in something as simple as a twilight bicycle ride or a short drive up the coast. As Cayucas, Yudin has set about creating an impressionistic portrait of summer's long, bittersweet dazzle.An avid bird-watcher, Yudin majored in both Music Theory/Production and Japanese. He spent a post-grad year living and teaching in Tokyo, then taking the past couple of years to hone the sound of Cayucas. He posted a couple of songs online, picking up a lot of love and attention, but it was only when he entered the studio with producer/multi-instrumentalist Richard Swift last year that Cayucas was truly defined — sun-inspired jams that touch upon The Animals, Harry Belafonte and the surfer-folk mysticism of the Northwest.