Founded on friendship, fun, and finding yourself, Pretty Sure has confidently made their own place in Grand Rapids’ diverse music scene—one that’s equal parts heart-on-your-sleeve vulnerability and mall-rat mischief.
They call it “goober punk.”
And on March 20, the three-piece will release “Places You’ve Been,” their second EP, before celebrating the new music with their biggest hometown headlining show yet on March 28 at The Pyramid Scheme.
Formed in the winter of 2022, Pretty Sure’s rise has been pretty steep. They’ve already released an earlier EP, two singles, and a full-length album – 2024’s “Too Early To Tell” – all while building a loyal following rooted as much in affirmation as amplification.
Best friends Bryce Couch (vocals/guitar), Colin Daniels (bass) and Kyle Harmon (drums) have been playing together since high school jazz band in Cincinnati.
Life eventually pulled them in different directions — college, other bands, relationships — before Couch relocated to Grand Rapids with his wife, while she pursued graduate studies at Grand Valley State University. The distance didn’t dissolve the friendship. It simply forced an evolution in how they would make music.
“It was a lot of learning how to do it, and learning what you can do with relatively little,” Couch said of forming Pretty Sure remotely. “I’d record an idea, we’d meet (over Zoom), talk details, smush everything together, and see where it fell.”
Those early songs showed the struggle of making things work, but also the promise and potential of what Pretty Sure would become as they continued to find a way to pivot their process.
“If we could get three demos in two months, that was huge,” Harmon said. “Now we’re overhauling parts, changing smaller minutiae, sending the same songs back and forth way more often. We really lock into what we want.”
That sharpened focus defines their new EP ‘Places You’ve Been.’
Following a whirlwind 40-hour tracking session at River City Studios for their full album in 2024, the band approached this EP differently, coming in to record at Cold War Studios more prepared and emotionally primed.
“We weren’t learning songs in the studio,” Couch said. “We were performing. It wasn’t saying, ‘I hope I can play this right.’ It was, ‘I am playing this right — how do I put the emotion and inflection into it?’”
Lyrically, Couch said he’s never felt more certain.
“There’s not a single word I would change throughout this entire upcoming EP,” he said. “We just pulled back the curtains, ripped our hearts out.”
It’s that unfiltered honesty — often wrapped in humor — that defines Pretty Sure’s ethos. That “goober punk” label started as a joke but stuck for a reason.
“When we recorded the first EP, it felt like being surrounded by our friends and reminiscing,” Harmon said. “There were a lot of laughs, a lot of goofs. We’re goobers.”
But finding that juxtaposition in their music quickly became the point.
“Punk has such a serious undertone,” he said. “People are severe when you think about punks, and goobers are not that.”
The band’s humor often masks heavy themes. A working title for one new song? “Peter Griffin Fortnite Skin.” The subject matter? Couch’s aging grandmother and the complexity of that relationship.
Still, beneath the silliness lies something intentional and affirming. Pretty Sure’s mission is clear: remind people they’re unique, capable and worth it.
Landing a Saturday night headliner slot alongside local powerhouses Low Phase and Ficus, plus Detroit’s Riot Course, only underscores how far they’ve come. The band has also enlisted local artists for the show flyer, partnered with favorite businesses for ticket giveaways and brought in local photographers and videographers to document the night.
“This event is 100 percent Grand Rapids from start to finish,” Couch says. “We’re blessed to be able to make music and have that be our vessel, but it takes a whole community of artists to make something like this happen.”
Grand Rapids has embraced them in return.
“It’s serious bottom-to-top here,” Harmon said. “There are very serious acts and very committed people playing at all levels, be it house shows, 200-person rooms, to full theaters… There’s really good hip-hop and R&B, DJs, and string quartets that are phenomenal.”
For Daniels, who still travels from Cincinnati, the connections have expanded both geography and identity.
“The Grand Rapids music scene has been very, very kind to me,” he said. “I’m happy to be part of the scene and expand part of the scene. And I think in turn, that scene has quite literally geographically expanded my area, but also me as a person.”
After the release of “Places We’ve Been,” Pretty Sure has nearly finished booking a 14-show spring tour hitting Milwaukee, Chicago, Nashville, Cincinnati and Muskegon.
“We’re still kind of the new kids on the block,” Couch said. “Everyone has been so welcoming and supportive. We’re really hoping this show and this release can serve as a big ‘thank you’ to Grand Rapids.”
Pretty Sure
“Places You’ve Been” EP Release
Wsg. Low Phase, Riot Course, Ficus
The Pyramid Scheme, 68 Commerce Ave. SW, Grand Rapids
March 28, 7 p.m., $12 advance
Pyramidschemebar.com, prettysure.bandcamp.com
