Florida, which plays Shuffle in Tampa, Florida on Feb. 22, 2025. Credit: Photo via floridausa/Bandcamp

Effortlessly cool, Billy Summer should be St. Petersburg’s dean of rock and roll.

Son of Dr. Robert Summer—former, director of choral studies at the University of South Florida, and founder of The Master Chorale of Tampa Bay—Billy is the kind of guy who sells vintage amps to The Who’s Pete Townshend, and also writes an entire album to Stephen Kings after the horror author unintentionally invokes his name for a book title.

As a sideman (a role he plays in Black Honkeys) or frontman, Summers also rips unapologetically, something he’s done for his many bands including The Semis, Luxury Mane, Hotel Life, and now Florida.

The latter plays a backyard gig in support of Metal Detector, a nine-track outing of rock and roll that thinks it’s power-pop, but is actually metal with a heavy glam polish.

Tickets to see Florida play Tampa Shuffle on Saturday, Feb. 22 are still available for $10.

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This article appears in Feb 13-19, 2025.