Galaxy Beat Releases Debut Extended Play Album

Julio Diaz was born to play music. 

In the late 2000s, he religiously listened to 93.1, a radio station that at the time featured alternative artists like Metallica and Nirvana. 

Inspired, Diaz began taking guitar classes at Hialeah Senior High School when he was 16 years old.

He practiced, playing  Metallica classics like Fade To Black, Enter Sandman and Nothing Else Matters. To feed his passion, Diaz’s mom gifted him an electric guitar for Christmas in 2011. 

Twelve years later, Diaz and two former North Campus classmates—Demetrius Conley and Shane Ragoonan—released their debut extended play album, Finally…….An EP with their band Galaxy Beat.

The album, which was released on Feb. 17, can be heard on Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music Unlimited, Tidal, Shazam and Deezer. 

“We feel accomplished,” Diaz said. “This is something we had been wanting to do for years.”

While studying psychology at Miami Dade College in 2016, Diaz played the guitar at the Lehman Theater at North Campus and at bars in Miami Springs. 

One day, while Diaz was practicing next to the lake on campus, Demetrius Conley approached him and proposed they form a band.        

“[He] caught my attention,” said Conley, who was studying music business and was previously  a drummer for another band for two years. “So I brought my snare drum and said ‘you know what I want to go over there and join [him].’”

Diaz then reached out to his childhood friend Shane Ragoonan, who had been playing the keyboard since high school, and asked him to join them. 

The trio, all North Campus students, combined their passion for rock, alternative music, funk and R&B to create Galaxy Beat. Conley is the drummer and Diaz and Ragoonan,who are the vocalists, perform the guitar and keyboard respectively.  

“We pride ourselves in being multi-genre,” said Ragoonan, who was inspired musically by his grandfather, who played the keyboard, and his dad, Sean, who was a rapper for the Nation Wide Rockers. “We dip our hands in almost everything.”

The band quickly gained traction, performing at club meetings and school events at North Campus. They also played at live venues like Estefan Kitchen and Churchill’s Pub.

During shows, which eventually expanded to locations in Coral Gables, Little Haiti and Fort Lauderdale, the group performed cover songs from bands like The Doors and Nirvana. The group practiced at Diaz’s house in Miami Gardens.

By 2017, Galaxy Beat released their first single, Wildflower. The song, written while Diaz was going through a breakup, emphasizes the importance of not judging a book by its cover. 

“We were elated,” Diaz said. “It was something we all created together and put a lot of hard work into.”

Despite wanting to release a debut album, the band faced time commitment issues and financial constraints and then the COVID-19 pandemic hindered their ability to practice and develop new music. 

That changed when Conley discovered an opportunity to record the band’s EP at a reduced rate last year. Tantalized by the offer, the group reconvened and developed the three-song EP album. The playlist features Mellow Fellow, Señorita Bonita and The Takeover. 

It celebrates the band completing their longtime goal to publish an EP. They recorded and edited the project in less than two weeks. 

“It was a couple of years since our single was released,” said Conley, who began playing the drums in 2006 after hearing Dani California by the Red Hot Chili Peppers. “I was super happy and excited to go back into the studio and record music.”

When they’re not performing, the group hangs out at local arcades and bars and devours food at restaurants like Flanigan’s and Popeyes. 

They also feature clips of practices and performances on their  Instagram page and Conley’s YouTube channel to promote the band.

Galaxy Beat’s next show will be on March 18 at the Miami-Dade County Youth Fair in Tamiami Park at 5 p.m. It will be their first public performance of their debut EP album.   

“It’s a sense of euphoria when we are playing music,” Ragoonan said. “You can’t touch music, but music can touch you.

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