NBC’s tv show Trauma will feature the Flipper song Be Good Child from the Love album tonight at 9:00pm.

Be sure to check it out or purchase the song from iTunes.

There was a Q&A at the San Francisco Main Library on October 7, 2009 for Punk Live on Film with photographer Ruby Ray and filmmaker Mindaugis Bagdon following the screening of Mindaugis’ LOUDER, FASTER, SHORTER, DEAF/PUNK by Richard Gaikowski, and INSECT LOUNGE, SALLY REMIX (Mutants) by Cinthea Fiss & Sally Webster. This video is Part 3 of 4 and feature’s Flipper’s Steve DePace, who clears up the origin of the band’s name.

The film event was in conjunction with Ruby Ray’s photo exhibition PUNK PASSAGE: SAN FRANCISCO FIRST WAVE PUNK 1977-1981 at the San Francisco library. If you’re in the area, be sure to check it out.

FLIPPER

with Triclops, Turks, and Alaric

Annie’s Social Club

917 Folsom St (at 5th St), San Francisco, CA

Show:    9:00pm
Doors:    8:00pm
Price:    $10.00

Cafe Du Nord presents

FLIPPER

with Toiling Midgets & Savage Republic

2170 Market Street, San Francisco, California

Tickets available online

The Love/Fight tour is currently underway in Australia. Here are some recent pictures – hope to see you on tour!

Bruce and Ted onstage at Esplanade

Rachel on stage at Esplanade

Steve onstage at Esplanade

Bruce onstage at Esplanade

Bruce / Backstage in Perth

Merch chick with attitude!

Merch Girls in Melbourne

Australian Tour Promoter / Record Label Dude

Esplanade Hotel in Melbourne

Bruce with a fan

Steve and Dr Lobotomy

Steve, Dr Lobotomy with PBS Radio Melbourne & Bruce

Esplanade Hotel in Melbourne

The day began with an in-store record signing…

…followed by a live radio performance in the evening at PBS Melbourne.

Radio Jock Mr Lobotomy doing the interview

Ted having a laugh. Rachel talking smack!

Australian Tour Promoter on his laptop

The tour starts June 4th, 2009 at the Amplifier Bar in Perth.

Flipper has left the Bay Area and is now in Australia (with a future stop to New Zealand too).

Hope to rock you on tour!

6.04.09 Amplifier Bar, Perth, Australia
6.05.09 Live on Light Square, Adelaide, Australia
6.06.09 The Esplanade Hotel, Melbourne, Australia
6.07.09 The Brisbane Hotel, Hobart, Australia
6.09.09 The Arthouse, Melbourne, Australia
6.11.09 The Step Inn, Brisbane, Australia
6.12.09 Australian National University Bar, Canberra, Australia
6.13.09 Manning Bar, Sydney University, Australia
6.14.09 Cambridge Hotel, Newcastle, Australia

Few know Flipper outside of that shirt Kurt Cobain was famously photographed wearing. However, the influence the San Francisco sludge punk act exerted on alternative music is undeniably recognisable. The precursor to bands like latter-day Black Flag and the Melvins, in the ‘70s and ‘80s Flipper helped create the fabric of modern day alt-rock. Their first studio album since 1993’s American Grafishy, Love sees Flipper capture all the irony, anger and urgency of their first two seminal albums. Accompanied by Fight, a disc recorded live by Jack Endino featuring some of the band’s classic material, Love is another Flipper masterpiece. Intentional or otherwise, the album has an endearing undercurrent of dark, ironic humour. The band has been playing for 30-plus years, yet hark the opening line to Be Good, Child! – “Growing up is hard, in this tough, old world“. Lyrically, Love is a refreshing return to the glory days of the Dead Kennedys and The Minutemen. The riffs on Why Can’t You See Me and Old Graves are uncomfortably slow and depressive, ex-Nirvana bassist Krist Novoselic’s low end offering a superb accompaniment to Ted Falconi’s guitar. Like the patented sludge sound Flipper fashioned for themselves back in the day, Love is bleak, impersonal and physically draining to listen to. In spite of the aural nuisance Flipper create, or perhaps because of it, Love is a piece of art that will resonate strongly with Flipper fans of old and fans of alt-rock discovering something new that feels genuine.

It’s either a testament to the biodiversity in the punk ecosystem or a measure of how badly punk’s spun out of control when a mere four days after Green Day drops its latest eyeliner-encrusted rock opera on the world that Flipper releases a new studio album. There’s a line scrawled in the sand. Pick your side: Appearances on Good Morning America or in smelly rock clubs. Anthems made to blare from radios or anthems made to peel paint off the walls. Rebellion as a catch phrase held over from the Bush II era or rebellion as a catch phrase held over from the Reagan era.

Flipper might not be the freshest punk act on the planet (really, though neither is Green Day), but the San Francisco noise freaks haven’t lost much of their early cachet. Sure, there’s nothing to rival the band’s 1982 noise-punk masterwork, “Sex Bomb” anywhere near Love, but Flipper’s still nearly as overworked, over-amplified and over-exaggerated as it was when the band was young.

With former Nirvana bassist Krist Novoselic holding down the low end, Flipper swims through a dirty sea of grimy noise. Novoselic’s bass lords over the mix, with Ted Falconi’s guitar’s low ends bleed into it as the foursome riles up listeners. You’ll either immediately fall in love with Love or you’ll be alienated and hate it forever. That’s just how all punk rock used to be, remember?

Garage noise and hardcore abandon make Love a testament to old-school punk confrontation. “Be Good, Child” comes out of the gate, with a bass line that rumbles and pummels with equal measure as frontman Bruce Loose barks with the insistence of a smoker with a pack-a-day habit asking — more like demanding — to bum a smoke. Falconi’s guitar attacks Novoselic’s concrete-crumbling bass line like an angle-grinder on “Triple Mass.” “Why Can’t You See” jumps head-first into that empty swimming pool of full-on noise-punk, breaking every bone in its body in a wild-eyed jaunt through punk’s seamiest moments.

If mainstream punk faces a destiny where repeated spit-polishing rubs it clean away, the murky underground world will be there with our helping of noise, grime and sleaze. Love is punk rock at its worst, which, really is when it’s at its best.

It really isn’t until the fourth track on “Love,” Flipper’s first set of original material since 1993, that you can exhale and believe. “Live Real” kicks in with the somber, hypnotic bass line, the scraping guitar, and the sarcastic ranting of Bruce Loose, announcing that Flipper has lost none of its rage nor humor.

It is dicey at first. The first three tracks, while decent, seem awkward. They are a mix of metal, Nirvana and old sentiments that ring a bit hollow. The titles alone-”Be Good, Child,” “Learn To Live” and “Only One Answer” sum up the lyrics and the stilted feel. What then gloriously ensues, however, are seven blistering, indelible songs that could only be the work of Flipper. Even without the late, great Will Shatter, Flipper immediately catches up with the times and their own legacy.

The most Flipper-esque tunes, “Why Can’t You See” and “Old Graves,” put the band’s newest member to work. Bassist Krist Novacelic has big sonic shoes to fill, but fill them he does, providing the murky, sludgy beat to all the songs, but especially giving these two tracks a classic feel. He teams nicely with the guitar of Ted Falconi, who remains ever adept at sawing through a melody. “Transparent Blame” and “Love Fight” are also immense, with Loose’s vocals as confrontational and insightful as ever.

Flipper were among the few bands that made your hair stand on end just by warming up. “Love” is not only a reminder of that (as is the killer live companion release, also on MVD, “Fight”) but stands on its own as in real time as a release by a band still vital, still fearless.