Flipper anniversary turns up the noise to 40 and beyond
It was clear Flipper needed practice. Holed up in an Oakland practice space on a recent Sunday afternoon, the three original members of the legendary San Francisco noise punk band were halfway through a set and they still hadn’t found that patented Flipper groove.
Then bassist Rachel Thoele played a new part she wrote for the song “Sacrifice.” The other members — original guitarist Ted Falconi and drummer Steve DePace — seemed open to her suggestions, even though it’s one of their oldest and best known tracks.
It did not work. The song stumbled and dragged. With the feedback still wailing, DePace yelled, “God damn it, Ted, why are you telling her she can change the songs?
“Every expert in every field will tell you to keep it to basic. Flipper is a threenote band!” he shouted.
“Actually, more like four,” replied Thoele.
That little tiff was all it took. The tension still palpable, the band jumped into “The Light, The Sound, The Rhythm, The Noise.” The bass and drums found their pocket right away in a plodding tempo, and after
a scream of feedback, Falconi started slashing away at his guitar. It all came together in a sound that fell somewhere between existential dread and impending doom — also known as the Flipper groove.
Forty years later, Flipper is still the band that Henry Rollins described as being “heavier than anything.” The group formed in San Francisco in 1979 by DePace, Falconi, bassist Russell “Will Shatter” Wilkerson and singer Bruce “Loose” Calderwood. Their formless jams earned them the nickname “The Grateful Dead of the ’80s,” but the punks loved them anyway. Within a year, they were opening for Public Image Limited and had a song on the popular compilation “S.F. Underground.” Two years later, Flipper released its first LP, “Album — Generic Flipper.”
“Even though the music was slow, there was nothing as punk as Flipper. It transcended punk,” said Los Angeles comedian and Flipper superfan Gregg Turkington.
The band was a large influence on the grunge scene, inspiring groups like the Melvins, Mudhoney and Nirvana (Kurt Cobain wore a handdrawn Flipper shirt the first time he appeared on “Saturday Night Live”). Even bands like R.E.M. covered their songs. Now Flipper is marking its 40th anniversary with a victory lap of a world tour, which includes stops at the Ritz in San Jose on Thursday, July 11, and in their hometown on Saturday, July 13, at the Great American Music Hall. Many of the shows will feature special guests like Nirvana’s Krist Novoselic and the Minutemen’s Mike Watt.
“We’re going to do this for real. It’s not just playing a few shows and saying, ‘Happy birthday, Flipper,’ ” said DePace. “We’re getting the whole thing up and going again, and rebuilding from the ground up to be bigger than ever.”
A new version of Flipper came together earlier this year with the additions of Thoele and David Yow of the Jesus Lizard on vocals. The band has already recorded material for two new releases — one a collaboration with the Melvins and the other a single with the label Joyful Noise. There could be more on the way, as DePace has been working on a publishing deal in the hopes of reissuing their catalog as well as releasing “Kali,” an album of material left over from the “Gone Fishin’ ” sessions in 1985.
Yow doesn’t plan to stick with the band after these 40thanniversary shows, but is happy to help Flipper transition to its new chapter.
The last four decades haven’t been easy for Flipper. DePace said that while he and Falconi focused on moving the band forward back in its ’80s heyday, Wilkerson and Calderwood took precautions to prevent more success. They burned agents, canceled tours for no reason and laughed off label reps who wanted to sign them. “I could tell you a thousand stories about them slamming doors in the face of opportunity,” said DePace.
But what hurt the band the most was drug addiction. Heroin killed two of Flipper’s members, the first being Wilkerson, the band’s “inhouse poet” and main songwriter. His death in 1987 ended the first version of the band.
There were other issues that would’ve broken lesser bands. Two crashes made it physically painful for Calderwood to continue singing. Falconi lost most of his teeth after being attacked by a group of teens near his Oakland home. Then late last year, DePace learned he had cancer in his lymph nodes. The inspiration for the anniversary tour came after he underwent chemo.
“I was excited to be alive, and I looked at the calendar and realized it was Flipper’s 40th anniversary,” said DePace. “I was like, ‘Let me call Ted and smack him around and see if I can get him to play again.’ ”
Flipper’s show on Saturday is particularly important as it is the band’s only San Francisco concert and its first time performing at the Great American Music Hall. Flipper plans to honor the occasion by memorializing the musicians from the local punk scene they’ve lost, like Wilkerson, Avengers bassist James Wilsey and Frightwig drummer Cecilia Kuhn, whose band is also opening the show.
“We opened for Flipper so many times back in the day, and we get to do it again,” said Frightwig’s Mia Simmans. “It feels like everything old is new again.”