D.C. post-punk band Flasher has been garnering rave reviews for its debut album Constant Image since it was released last summer. But before all that, it wasn’t that long ago that drummer Emma Baker, bassist Danny Saperstein, and guitarist Taylor Mulitz were in high school attending D.C. house parties, whose eclectic lineups led to their current musical state of being.
“The main locus of all the local music was one house on Gallatin and 14th Street called Girl Cave,” says Saperstein. “That was really eye-opening for us in terms of the confluence of everything. Those shows would be like the loudest bands I ever heard at a house show, and then the third band would be a totally unplugged band that sounded like Leonard Cohen. I think that’s part of the reason it seems obvious to try our hand at playing music no matter where its influence comes from and try instrumentation from Fugazi to My Bloody Valentine to Elliott Smith to ‘Til Tuesday.”
It’s no surprise then that their music reaches far beyond the generic label of ‘D.C. punk band,’ with influences that range everywhere from The Jesus and Mary Chain to The Breeders. Since its release last summer, the group has sparked national chatter, made an appearance on NPR Music’s Tiny Desk Concert Series, and was hailed as one of Rolling Stone’s Artists You Need to Know.
Now as the trio gears up for a slate of festival warm-up gigs, including an appearance at Comet Ping Pong on June 19, they’ve had a chance to take stock of the last twelve months of their lives, which was the musical equivalent of being shot out of a cannon.
For Mulitz, the positive reaction to the album has been a combination of business as usual with just a splash of bewilderment. “I mean, definitely, there are a lot more people that listen to our music,” he explains. “But it doesn’t feel insanely different, other than working with a bigger label like Domino [Records].”
When it comes to the Rolling Stone praise however, the guitarist can’t help but sound a tad astonished. “It’s kind of crazy,” says Mulitz. “These [are] publications that you grow up reading–especially as a child–and dreaming about being in. So then when it happens, it’s like “Whoa!”
Such a reaction is fairly normal for guys who are old enough to have witnessed shows at the Grog & Tankard (D.C.’s punk/go-go version of CBGB’s—Mulitz made his live debut there in 2007) and the last remnants of the HFStival (an annual music festival held by radio station WHFS from 1990-2006 and 2010-11). They’re simply carrying on the culture of what they experienced growing up, even if getting permission to go to these shows did require some verbal arm-twisting of their parents.
“The first shows that we went to were all house shows so they were like people that we still know who were a bit older than us,” says Saperstein. “I was like 11, 12, 13 and the shows were all-ages in D.C. Mostly they were at community centers or the Electric Maid. I just remember constantly having that fight with my folks to, like, just drop me off.”
Baker and Saperstein, who have know each other since their fathers both attended the same New York rabbinical school, first joined forces in high school in a band called Sad Bones. Mulitz met them at a house party in 2007 while he was playing in another band. The three formed Flasher post-college in 2015, and independently released their debut EP the following year.
As the band started to hash out their sound, it was quite clear that all of the influences they had witnessed were going to play a part in their songwriting. The results include harmonies and arrangements on songs like “Sun Come and Golden” and “Go” that sound like a love letter to Pixies’ Doolittle era, while “Pressure” sounds like The Stone Roses after 10 cups of coffee.
For members of the general public who might think D.C. musicians only produce two genres of music—punk and go-go—Saperstein is quick to point out the musical diversity of the scene.
“I think that’s something that people maybe misunderstand who aren’t from D.C.,” says Saperstein. “What feels like D.C. music, was that there was always an eclectic mix of genres at shows all the time. I don’t remember any shows where all the bands sounded like they could be on the same label. It was always a weird mix of dance and noise and hardcore and metal and hip-hop and singer-songwriter.”
Continuing to mesh these influences as they write new songs (with a tentative release date of mid-2020), one of the most important lessons Flasher has learned is not to be too precious with their material.
“Literally the other day our new favorite song that we wrote was this one section over and over again” says Mulitz. “We started flushing out the verse of it and a pre-chorus and by the time we came back to that original part that we’d playing for about a month, we just realized that it didn’t work anymore. And we just completely rewrote it and that song is better for it. And that is an experience that we’re constantly having.”
Flasher plays Comet Ping Pong on June 19 with special guests Lithics. 9 p.m. Tickets $12.
