“Graham, the band’s new studio bassist, also is the Epcot connection. Based in Baltimore, he was vacationing at the theme park when he met Fargnoli. In a long-distance musical relationship, the Orlando keyboardist added tracks to a new release by Graham’s band, The Dirty Marmaduke Flute Squad, and enlisted the bassist to play on the new Hadley’s Hope material.

Eventually, Graham was enlisted to mix and master those songs at a studio in Baltimore. “

Check out the rest of the article about their collaboration here and find out more about Hadley’s Hope on their Facebook page.

In related news, Father Ryan is officially accepting new clients at 37.5: The Studio, where he recorded, mixed, and mastered “Die Humpin!”, “Super Galatic Space Banana”, “Boneslinky!” and the new Hadley’s Hope EP. So if you liked the sound of any of those albums and are a band or singer/songwriter looking for a place to lay down some tracks, drop him a line via Facebook, through this site, or at ryan at 37point5.com!!!

“When in conjuncture with a change of musical stylistic return to the US’ ’30s and ’40s for the great tune “You’re Special”, a reminiscence to Spike Jones pushed itself upon me!”

Click here for the rest of this (unintentionally?) hilarious review!

And here’s a great write-up from Al Shipley, one of Baltimore’s finest music critics:

“…the album stands as a document, for better or worse, of all the strange things the band were capable of that nobody else has the balls, or the utter shamelessness, to even think of trying.”

Read the rest at Al’s blog! 

Click Here to Read the Review!

“…it’s almost like a really bad trip whilst on crystal meth and only ever having listened to the Dwarves and bad 70′s TV themes for inspiration.“

And if that review got you all pumped up to get your own copy of “Boneslinky!”, you can purchase it at iTunes, or download it in hi-res FLAC (or any format of your choice) at http://music.theflutesquad.com. 

If you want an actual, physical CD to hold tight against your (insert body part here), there are a very limited number left!  You can either purchase them at CDBaby or contact us directly via email at nikc@theflutesquad.com

DMFS fell under the “The longer, the better?” category with the likes of Kevin Troy Boy Toy And The Almost Virgins Pajama Party, Shallow Grave Satanic Symphony and our friends The Slowest Runner In All The World.

We graciously accept this dubious honor. We’ve known all about our really long band name ever since we were hand scribbling it on paper bags.

.2010: The year in band names

 

by Kyle Ryan January 5, 2011

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A new year means more than crowded gyms for a few weeks: All across the world, people are vowing to make 2011 the year they finally start a band. And when they do, they’ll need a name—and chances are, it’ll be inane. Every year, The A.V. Club sees thousands of band names, so we like to consider ourselves experts in noting the memorable ones. Like its predecessors, 2010 provided a bounty of silliness, forced toughness, and further testament to the unbreakable will of bands insisting on putting exclamation points or the word “funk” in their names. Behold!

Movie references
We Can’t Bury Shelley
Hudson Mohawke
Scarlett O’Hara
How cute—they have the same hair stylist as Justin Bieber!

Jackie And The Treehorns
Fuck Your Yankee Blue Jeans
Earth Girls Are Easy
PS I Love You
Okay, technically not tied to the movie, according to Exclaim, but guilty by association.
(Stop Worrying And) Love The Bomb

The Simpsons/TV references
Who Shot Mr. Burns
Looks like Maggie was more successful here—it appears they broke up.
Bloodbath And Beyond
Song title: “Eat A Bowl Of Fuckstick.” May have changed their name to ZZ BOTTOM.
Knifey Spoonie
Guantanamo Baywatch

Band & song references
Say Like The French Say (Fugazi reference?)
Depeche Node

Fuck
Fuck Fuck
Alaskan Thunderfuck
For a band seemingly named after a strain of marijuana, it has a bummer of a bio:

“A solo project to explore the notions of depression through imagery and music. Hopefully to captivate a single chord that expresses the way we feel when we are abandoned and capsized by that subtle feeling of melancholy.” 

The Fuck You Kiss My Asses
Big Fuckin Skull

“In the beginning, there was the Big Fuckin Skull… When or where It came from is unknowable and doesn’t matter, but it was no doubt a really mean and shitty time and place. You know; the kind of time and place capable of producing a killer skull the size of Texas, filled with fuckin hatred.”

The Fucking Hotlights
Angelfuk
Cutfucker
Sister Fucker
Ferocious Fucking Teeth

Shit
Turncoat Dropping Shit
Bring That Shit
Shit And Shine
“Four drummers, two bassists, one vocalist, all awesome.”
Shitty Advice
Shit Fight

Sex
Sextacy
Sexual Atrocities
“Formerly Screaming Afterbirth.”
The Fuk Holz
Sex Unicorn
The first Google result for this is for “the Polysoutheast Council”:

“If you’re looking for a real live sex toy or an interchangeable, faceless partner, rent one by the hour. Or you might try checking out swingers groups instead of poly groups, if sex is your primary goal. Unicorns are rare, and honestly, most of those you find in polyamorous groups are not interested in what you’re offering.”

Pop Culture Rape Victim
FistingYouENT

Vaginas
Vagiant
It has since changed its name to the less memorable “Tijuana Sweetheart.” Bummer.
Choice Cunts
V.A.G.
The Irish band’s name is short for “Very Angry Girls.”
Sparklepussy Barbie

Tits / Dangerous for Google Image Search
Bad Tits
Puffy Areolas
Scary Areolas

Dinosaurs
Stegosaurus Flex
Another one that has changed its name: Castlenova. That’s just generic, a step up from bad.
Thesaurus Rex

“Thesaurus Rex is the manifestation of all the ill shit I’ve conjured until now, lyrically.”

Dubasaurus
Pterodacdudes
Bio: “dudes on, shirts off” R.I.P.—they played their last show in June.

Dead bodies
Corpse Timer
Polkadot Cadaver
Featuring former members of the egregiously named Dog Fashion Disco!
Annotations Of An Autopsy
Song titles: “In Snakes I Bathe,” “Prosthetic Erection”
A Corpse Vanishes
Diggin’ Up Grandpa

The longer, the better?
Everybody Was In The French Resistance…Now!
The Bewitched Hands On The Top Of Our Heads
They’re French, so maybe it doesn’t sound as clunky in their native tongue?
The Scattered Remains Of A More Glorious Past
The Slowest Runner In All The World
Everything You’ve Ever Known Is A Piece Of Light
The Mystic Order Of Reverb And Twang
The Dirty Marmaduke Flute Squad
Kevin Troy Boy Toy And The Almost Virgins Pajama Party

The World Is A Beautiful Place And I Am No Longer Afraid To Die

No major statements. No lamenting the current state of music. It’s quite simple really. The day after our awesome CD release show for Boneslinky! we were hanging out, drinking beer, and our conversation kind of went like this:

“That was an awesome show last night!”

“Yeah, we really packed The Wind-Up Space!”

“Was anyone from the local press there?”

“Of course not. But we got rid of all of our CD’s…”

“Really?”

“Yeah, everyone got one.”

“Awesome. So what now?”

“I dunno, I don’t really feel like doing all that work to pack houses anymore.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, it’s a big giant pain in the ass.”

“I know!”

“So…”

“Yeah, fuck it let’s quit.”

“Cool.”

No more talk of our goals or getting an endorsement deal from Party City. Or even collaborating withour hero Benny Mardones.  As it turns out, being in a band affords a lot of great opportunities and quality time with friends, but it’s surrounded by a ton of heartbreak as well. For example, you’re constantly vying for the favor of the press, who’s hardly competent at what they do. It’s sort of like trying to get your drunk deadbeat dad to play catch with you. You know he should, he knows he should too. He may even muster up enough strength to humor you for a few minutes every once in a while. But deep down, you know you were way happier when his existence didn’t even cross your mind.

Or like when your biggest fan gets life in prison for shooting his girlfriend in the chest. Nobody else cares, but the letters keep coming. What’s sadder than telling a newly-sentenced inmate that his favorite band now feels that eating pizza and watching “The Walking Dead” is a much better way to spend their time?

It’s not all bad though.  For example, this blog will live on in some form or shape (’cause writing is a great way to get free shit.) We probably won’t update once a week. But really, whenever we find something interesting enough to write about, it will find its way on here.

Father Ryan O’Graham will continue to produce music starting sometime in the next 3-4 months. So if your band is ready to bring the “magic”, I highly recommend contacting us through this page.

As for me, I’ll be spending more time working with Mondo Baltimore, and figuring out what makes me happy after making music under the same brand for 8 years. Oh and I’ll be laughing (with the rest of the guys) at Horsepower as he begins his self-sacrificial work on an alpaca ranch. Ha- to the motherfuckin-Ha!

—

DMFS Boot photo by Marc Hartley. Click here to see all of Marc’s photos of the Boneslinky! CD release show.

FINALLY! Our CD Release is this Friday at The Windup Space. So while we’re alerting the proper authorities, our very serious thoughts about band marketing (aka: how to get free shit just by being a big enough jackass to walk around in public in a children’s costume) are on hold just for this week.

In the meantime, help us out by contributing to our Kickstarter fund (click on the funny pic on the right!). This helps us cover the costs of creating the album and keeps us doing what we do best: making offensive wannabe art rock.

So far, the contributions to our Kickstarter fund have been amazing. Our friend and fan Jon Cook graciously gave us a hundred bucks to throw a show at his house. And some dude by the name of “Jesus” gave us $50 and wanted nothing in return. Weird.

Even $5 helps us out immensely and gets you a download of the album, which in my opinion has to be one of the best albums any costume band from Baltimore has put out in the ’10s.

See you folks at the Windup Space this Friday at 9pm. Oh yeah, in case we didn’t mention it, it’s a Baltimore Beer Week event, and there will be some phat specials on Raven Beer all night!

I’ve come to tell you that there is a sure fire gateway to garnering attention. In fact it can be remarkably easy!

Malcolm Gladwell’s excellent book The Tipping Point discusses the processes that occur when ideas become viral. And Seth Godin’s Purple Cow concludes that in today’s world there is only one path to success: to be remarkable. In terms of going viral there are two roads to take, and it’s important to distinguish the two and realize which path is right for you. Do you want good attention or bad attention? I think as an up and coming band it’s perfectly fine to have the latter if the intent is to end up with the former. In terms of your act, it’s important to be remarkable in anyway possible. Since, musical skill and talent takes time you might want to focus solely on being remarkably offensive, whether in form (“they are the WORST BAND I’ve EVER SEEN”) or by crafting your song content accordingly.

Enter “Stem Cellphones” the 8th track from the superbly rocking Boneslinky!. The story of this song starts a few years back when Cap’n Mediocrity and I made a music video for “Diary of an Unborn Child,” one of the strangest pro-life jams ever created, performed by “Bobby’s World”-biting weirdo Lil’ Marky.

The video features an unmasked Mediocrity drifting around as a grown-up aborted fetus. Much to our surprise the video became a bit of a hit on YouTube, garnering over 40,000 views and recieving comments like:

“do you think this is fucking FUNNY?! ASSHOLE!” (yes)

and

“piece of ass raping shit” (huh?)

but also comments like:

“I just laughed so hard. You win the internet.” (well…yeah)

It took a while for the good comments to actually show up. For a while it was just comment after comment of pro-lifers arguing with each other.

And thus my lesson was learned: If you create something that is flagrantly anti-pro-life (note: anti-pro-life is not the same as pro-choice), fanatics are going to immediately jump all over you. It’s just their nature, they can’t help it. And they’re really just standing by waiting for the opportunity to turn your comments board into an endless political debate. So I decided to write my own song surrounding this turbulent issue in hopes to once again incite some lunatics. Who knows, maybe some of them will download the album in order to burn it to a CD and subsequently toss the burned CD into a raging fire!

“Stem Cellphones” is the story of a slacker whose far-along baby-mama falls into a coma. Instead of saving the baby, he opps to harvest the precious rejuvenating stem cells in order to restore parts of his own body that have degenerated after years of alcohol abuse. The song ends with him realizing that his theories don’t really stand up to how science works.

No I don’t really agree with eating your unborn children in order to restore your own failing body, but you have to admit it’s a fascinating concept. One that should probably get pitched to Hollywood and directed by that Human Centipede dude. Now there’s some fucked up shit right there. If you’re pissed off about this song, you should probably just go bother that guy, ’cause people existing only as a bridge between one person’s ass and anothers mouth is a far more disturbing idea than anything the Flute Squad can come up with. At least our songs have happy endings and boobies.

***

If you enjoyed this post, check out:

MISADVENTURES IN SONGWRITING: TV’s Corky Is Our ‘The Beatles’ : The story behind a song that honors retarded people for their courageous sense of style.

MISADVENTURES IN SONGWRITING: Nobody Cares About Your Love-Life, Watch Cartoons For Inspiration Instead: How our fearless frontman, Horsepower, writes songs about beating the shit out of people over cartoons and a tasty breakfast.

September is a weird time of year. After the rush of summer, it starts to become evident where exactly the year is headed. One is able to predict with near-certainty what is actually going to get accomplished and what will have to be put on the following years RESOLUTIONS list. The icing on the cake is that with 9 months passed, you start to see which goals are most important and which ones were thrown in the mix possibly during a drug-induced panic attack.

With this in mind, let’s check in to see how we are doing with the goals we set at the beginning of the year, and subsequently tightened up during quarter two.

1. Obtain $10,000 in revenue for all three bands

This simply isn’t going to happen. We haven’t played enough shows this year to even think about raising this amount of money. With that being said, shows are starting to pop up again. One major accomplishment within this goal is that we have managed to play our highest paying gigs ever during 2010.

The practice of being picky about which shows you play is probably the biggest advancement any gigging band can make. Not only does it make your shows more “valuable” in the eyes of people who actually go out to see music, it ensures that you don’t get burnt out on your own gimmicks.

In light of all the other projects and mini-projects we’ve worked on throughout the year, I’m happy with the amount of money we’ve made. Then again, I’m happy eating “Oriental-flavored” Ramen noodles as a midnight snack.

2. Finish and release The Dirty Marmaduke Flute Squad’s Boneslinky!

Done and done. Boneslinky! launches in physical form on October 8th. You can nab a digital copy right now on our music page. Now here comes the fun part: promoting this great album and selling it out. Things have changed a lot since 2007. For one, our contacts list we created during the release of Die Humpin! is completely out of date. It’s crazy to think that after just 3 short years most of the writers and editors we sent stuff to have left their jobs, while lots of music magazines and newspapers have folded.

Secondly, the press isn’t really the press anymore. Blogs have come to dominate commentary on indie music. That’s a really cool yet frustrating prospect. Most of these blogs define “indie music” as sounding something like Animal Collective, The Antlers or Surfer Blood leaving little room for rock-cum-ragtime comedy songs about abortion. That’s fine (I listen to these bands as well), but hopefully we’ll be able to find some music blogs that will open up and take a risk on reviewing our music.

3. Post every week NO MATTER WHAT!

This has been possibly the biggest challenge, but also the biggest reward. We’ve been getting great comments and feedback on this blog. And we managed to lock down a gig reviewing Steven Slate FG-X (which also allowed us to master our album with this awesome piece of software). Writing for Weird Experiments in Band Marketing also forces us to take time every single week to think about the band. I like this concept alot, since bands tend to have two modes: ON and OFF. Even when we had no shows and no new products to promote, The Dirty Marmaduke Flute Squad was BUSY. That’s a really cool feeling to have. Now we have shows and product, so things will only get much more hectic and hopefully even more rewarding.

4. Obtain an official endorsement from Party City

Fuck this. I don’t really no where I was coming from with this goal, and I’ve been way too busy to pursue it. I can say that we managed to get a nice endorsement from Raven Beer and over-deliver in our promotion of their great product. In fact let’s breakdown some of things we’ve done to promote this product to our fans.

a.) Organized a professional Flute Squad/Raven Beer photo shoot for press use.

b.) Placed a Raven Beer ad on the front page of this site.

c.) Featured Raven Beer in our album art and show flyers.

d.) Tied-in Raven Beer with our CD release show and as a part of Baltimore Beer Week.

e.) Promoted giveaways of Raven Beer swag on Facebook and our shows.

f.) Appeared publicly at Pigtownfest to promote Raven Beer at their tent.

Why do we do this? Well for one, it’s a really solid product that we can get behind. But also because we want to prove that when we receive an endorsement from a product we’re really going to do our best to promote the hell out of it. We’ve been talking about doing a Raven Beer jingle, but I think we’re going to wait and see how they might use it.

5. Build our Facebook fanbase

This has seemed to slow down. My prediction is that without a solid show schedule mapped out, our fanbase will remain stagnant. So it looks like the focus should be playing more shows in order to make some money and to gain more fans. Sometimes the biggest answers are the most obvious.

***

To see how we’ve progressed through the year, check out these posts:

Band Goals For 2010: Our initial post announcing our goals for 2010.

Reflections on Q1: Our goal progress check-in from January to March of 2010

Stealing a move from our mentors in selling out (KISS), The Dirty Marmaduke Flute Squad is taking on yet another segment of the media. This time it’s comic books. We’re releasing Livelihood: Billy Jump featuring The Dirty Marmaduke Flute Squad in tandem with our new album Boneslinky! And if you are lucky enough to jump on this early you can nab a real physical version of this limited 27-page comic book release.

I can’t tell you how excited I am to, you know, see myself in a comic book. It seems very surreal to say the least. It’s looking like this is going to be the first of many, as we have about six scripts in the vault with plotlines that will match up with songs from Boneslinky! This 27-page comic harkens back to the origins of the band and is a prequel to DMFS’s 2005 zombie comedy flick “Livelihood” (click the link to put it in your Netflix queue.)

If you’re in to reading books and comics on your computers, readers, or whathaveyous, you can purchase it on WOWIO for a whopping ONE DOLLAR. WOWIO was kind enough to name Livelihood as the Featured Comic of the Month in their monthly newsletter.

If you are a HUGE fan of comic books, please hit us up in the comments section. We’d love to get feedback of the comic from a real comic book fan and maybe get some ideas on where to send it for review.

When we play “You’re Special” live we usually get some half-hearted applause and a lot of slack-jawed stares from the audience.  I’m pretty sure they don’t know whether they should laugh or boo us off the stage.

On first listen, the song might seem to be a rip on mentally challenged kids, wrapped in a nice sugar-coated package of Tin Pan Alley/Paul McCartney ragtime pop.  So right there is a disconnect that confuses people.  I mean, how often do you hear songs with clarinets and ukuleles where the vocalist is crooning about Down’s Syndrome in his best old-tyme voice?

But I’m here to tell you that it’s okay to smile and sing along to this upbeat ditty, because we’re not making fun of the disabled, we’re *celebrating* them!  WE <3 “SPECIAL” KIDS!!!

When I was in Elementary School my best friend had an older brother, Jay, who had Down’s.  I thought Jay was one of the coolest kids I knew because he wore crazy clothes and could do the Sit-N-Spin faster than anyone.  Plus, he was a genuinely fun guy and I always enjoyed hanging out with him.

Because of my friendship with Jay, I always held a soft spot in my cold, evil heart for kids with mental disabilities.  So when “Life Goes On” premiered in 1989 I religiously watched every episode, and got really pissed when they stopped focusing on Corky and started up with that bullshit Chad Lowe AIDS plotline.  Fuck Chad Lowe.  Anyway, I became a huge Chris Burke fan and continued to follow his career, even when it seemed like most people had forgotten all about him.

I remember back in college I found out that Chris had a band and was recording love songs, and there was a music video for one of the songs where he was running towards a girl on a beach.  I desperately wanted to track down this album and it became somewhat of an obsession.  Granted, this was pre-Al Gore’s Internet, so there was no good way to find info on obscure stuff like Corky and scat porn.  After a while I sort of gave up and figured I’d never have the pleasure of hearing Corky sing a love song.

Years went by and I moved to Baltimore and forgot all about Corky and Jay (life goes on, I suppose.)  But then my job as a roving IT consultant brought me to The ARC.  ARC used to stand for Association for Retarded Citizens, but they cover that up now because apparently “retarded” has become a derogatory word.  Which is totally retarded.  Anyway, I worked at The ARC and met a lot of cool people with a variety of developmental disabilities, and that made me think of Corky again, so I looked him up on the interwebs and HOLY FUCKING SHIT CORKY IS PLAYING WITH HIS BAND NEXT WEEK ONLY 50 MILES AWAY FROM WHERE I LIVE!!!

Turns out that almost every year Friends of Frederick, an organization devoted to helping out mentally challenged kids, invites Chris Burke to perform at their yearly “Buddy Walk”.  So I fucking freaked out and cancelled all of my prior engagements and drove to Frederick one beautiful fall afternoon to watch Corky strut his stuff.  And let me tell you, that man is a consummate entertainer.  Totally pro, very charismatic, and quite talented.  Unfortunately he’s flanked by two creepy twin brothers who probably steal all of his money and beat him with sacks of cauliflower.  Assholes.

But what was really cool about the show was the audience: dozens of kids with Down’s wearing crazy outfits and dancing and singing like they were the only person there.  Total disregard for what anyone thought about the way they looked or acted, just pure joy to be listening to good music from a musician they respected.  Basically the complete opposite of the hipster douchebags who frequent shows in Baltimore.  It was quite refreshing.

The Chris Burke concert brought me back to thinking about Jay, and how he was the same way: carefree, outgoing, and not at all self-conscious.  And so I decided to write a song in tribute to these fine people who I think we can all learn a lot from.  Their free spirit is a living example of how we could have much more fun in life if we simply stopped worrying about what other people think of us.  Because, seriously, there’s no way you’re going to be cooler than this guy, so why bother even trying?