The Flying Luttenbachers
Encyclopedia
The Flying Luttenbachers were an instrumental unit led by multi-instrumentalist
/ composer
/ producer
Weasel Walter
. The Luttenbachers have created a large body of work focusing on an agenda of musical extremity and dissonance
. Over the course of the band, the personnel has shifted numerous times around the artistic leadership of Walter, each line-up revealing a different part of the Flying Luttenbachers' aesthetic. The music has run a gamut from intense, all-acoustic free improvisation, to complex, modernistic rock composition; pure electronic noise to primitive punk-inspired jazz
. The music defies idiomatic cliché
and is steadfastly abstract, choosing to work outside of pre-existing genres in order to attain an original fusion. Walter has been quoted as drawing inspiration from the fields of hardcore punk
, black metal
, progressive rock
, free jazz
, no wave
, electronic noise
, contemporary classical, Balinese gamelan
and Noh
music.
in Chicago, Illinois
as a punk jazz
trio, with Hal Russell
(tenor and soprano saxophones, trumpet), Chad Organ (tenor saxophone) and Weasel Walter (drums). The band derived their moniker from Russell's birthname, Harold Luttenbacher. Russell left the band in June 1992, and was soon replaced by Ken Vandermark
for the recording of the Flying Luttenbachers' first 7" record.
The band has since featured a frequently shifting cast of notable free jazz and experimental rock musicians, including Fred Lonberg-Holm
, Kurt Johnson
, Jeb Bishop
, Alex Perkolup, Mick Barr
, Ed Rodriguez, Mike Green and Jonathan Hischke. The Flying Luttenbachers have toured Europe and the US extensively with bands like The Locust
, Arab On Radar
, Lightning Bolt, U.S. Maple
, Erase Errata
, Bobby Conn
, and Wolf Eyes
. Walter moved from Chicago to Oakland, California
in 2003, beginning yet another incarnation of the group. The live band played their final concert in November 2006. The Flying Luttenbachers project officially ceased operation in November 2007 upon the release of a final studio album (recorded solo by Walter).
Multi-instrumentalist
A multi-instrumentalist is a musician who plays a number of different instruments.The Bachelor of Music degree usually requires a second instrument to be learned , but people who double on another instrument are not usually seen as multi-instrumentalists.-Classical music:Music written for Symphony...
/ composer
Composer
A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
/ producer
Record producer
A record producer is an individual working within the music industry, whose job is to oversee and manage the recording of an artist's music...
Weasel Walter
Weasel Walter
Weasel Walter is a composer and instrumentalist who founded the band The Flying Luttenbachers in Chicago in 1991 with late jazz cult figure Hal Russell and is a current member of Cellular Chaos and Behold...The Arctopus...
. The Luttenbachers have created a large body of work focusing on an agenda of musical extremity and dissonance
Dissonance
Dissonance has several meanings, all related to conflict or incongruity:*Consonance and dissonance in music are properties of an interval or chord*Cognitive dissonance is a state of mental conflict...
. Over the course of the band, the personnel has shifted numerous times around the artistic leadership of Walter, each line-up revealing a different part of the Flying Luttenbachers' aesthetic. The music has run a gamut from intense, all-acoustic free improvisation, to complex, modernistic rock composition; pure electronic noise to primitive punk-inspired jazz
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
. The music defies idiomatic cliché
Cliché
A cliché or cliche is an expression, idea, or element of an artistic work which has been overused to the point of losing its original meaning or effect, especially when at some earlier time it was considered meaningful or novel. In phraseology, the term has taken on a more technical meaning,...
and is steadfastly abstract, choosing to work outside of pre-existing genres in order to attain an original fusion. Walter has been quoted as drawing inspiration from the fields of hardcore punk
Hardcore punk
Hardcore punk is an underground music genre that originated in the late 1970s, following the mainstream success of punk rock. Hardcore is generally faster, thicker, and heavier than earlier punk rock. The origin of the term "hardcore punk" is uncertain. The Vancouver-based band D.O.A...
, black metal
Black metal
Black metal is an extreme subgenre of heavy metal music. Common traits include fast tempos, shrieked vocals, highly distorted guitars played with tremolo picking, blast beat drumming, raw recording, and unconventional song structure....
, progressive rock
Progressive rock
Progressive rock is a subgenre of rock music that developed in the late 1960s and early 1970s as part of a "mostly British attempt to elevate rock music to new levels of artistic credibility." John Covach, in Contemporary Music Review, says that many thought it would not just "succeed the pop of...
, free jazz
Free jazz
Free jazz is an approach to jazz music that was first developed in the 1950s and 1960s. Though the music produced by free jazz pioneers varied widely, the common feature was a dissatisfaction with the limitations of bebop, hard bop, and modal jazz, which had developed in the 1940s and 1950s...
, no wave
No Wave
No Wave was a short-lived but influential underground music, film, performance art, video, and contemporary art scene that had its beginnings during the mid-1970s in New York City. The term No Wave is in part satirical word play rejecting the commercial elements of the then-popular New Wave genre...
, electronic noise
Electronic noise
Electronic noise is a random fluctuation in an electrical signal, a characteristic of all electronic circuits. Noise generated by electronic devices varies greatly, as it can be produced by several different effects...
, contemporary classical, Balinese gamelan
Gamelan
A gamelan is a musical ensemble from Indonesia, typically from the islands of Bali or Java, featuring a variety of instruments such as metallophones, xylophones, drums and gongs; bamboo flutes, bowed and plucked strings. Vocalists may also be included....
and Noh
Noh
, or - derived from the Sino-Japanese word for "skill" or "talent" - is a major form of classical Japanese musical drama that has been performed since the 14th century. Many characters are masked, with men playing male and female roles. Traditionally, a Noh "performance day" lasts all day and...
music.
History
The Flying Luttenbachers formed in December 19911991 in music
See also:* 1991 in music Record labels established in 1991-Summary:The year 1991 is the year that grunge music made its popular breakthrough. Nirvana's Nevermind, led by the surprise hit single "Smells Like Teen Spirit", becomes the most popular U.S. album of the year...
in Chicago, Illinois
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
as a punk jazz
Punk jazz
Punk jazz describes the amalgamation of elements of the jazz tradition with the instrumentation or conceptual heritage of punk rock...
trio, with Hal Russell
Hal Russell
Hal Russell was an American free jazz musician. He performed mainly on drums and saxophone, but occasionally on trumpet or vibraphone. Russel's fiery music was marked by significant humor, not unlike much of Dutch drummer Han Bennink's output...
(tenor and soprano saxophones, trumpet), Chad Organ (tenor saxophone) and Weasel Walter (drums). The band derived their moniker from Russell's birthname, Harold Luttenbacher. Russell left the band in June 1992, and was soon replaced by Ken Vandermark
Ken Vandermark
Ken Vandermark is an American jazz composer and saxophone and clarinet player.A fixture on the Chicago-area music scene since the 1990s, Vandermark has earned wide critical praise for his playing and his multilayered compositions, which typically balance intricate orchestration with passionate...
for the recording of the Flying Luttenbachers' first 7" record.
The band has since featured a frequently shifting cast of notable free jazz and experimental rock musicians, including Fred Lonberg-Holm
Fred Lonberg-Holm
Fred Lonberg-Holm is an American cellist based in Chicago. He relocated from New York City to Chicago in 1995.Lonberg-Holm is most identified with playing free improvisation and free jazz. He is also a composer of concert works...
, Kurt Johnson
Kurt Johnson
Kurt Johnson is a professional American drag racing driver. He was born in Virginia, Minnesota, and currently resides in Buford, Georgia. He competes in the NHRA’s POWERade Drag Racing series, driving a Chevrolet Cobalt in the Pro Stock category...
, Jeb Bishop
Jeb Bishop
Jeb Bishop is an American jazz trombone player.He grew up in Raleigh, North Carolina. He has studied music at Northwestern University, engineering and philosophy at North Carolina State University, and philosophy at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the University of Arizona,...
, Alex Perkolup, Mick Barr
Mick Barr
Mick Barr is an American avant-garde metal guitarist. Notable for his relentless speed and agility on his instrument, he is most well known for being one half of the band Orthrelm, currently signed to Mike Patton's Ipecac Recordings label....
, Ed Rodriguez, Mike Green and Jonathan Hischke. The Flying Luttenbachers have toured Europe and the US extensively with bands like The Locust
The Locust
The Locust is a musical group from San Diego, California, United States known for their unique mix of grindcore speed and aggression, mathcore complexity, and new wave weirdness.- Style :...
, Arab On Radar
Arab on Radar
Arab on Radar are a Providence, Rhode Island based noise rock band founded in 1994. They went on hiatus in 2002. Members of the band went on to form or join the bands The Chinese Stars, Athletic Automaton, Made in Mexico, and most recently Doomsday Student...
, Lightning Bolt, U.S. Maple
U.S. Maple
U.S. Maple was an American noise rock band. The group formed in Chicago in 1995. The band consists of Al Johnson , Mark Shippy , Pat Samson , and Todd Rittmann — who banded together with the intent of becoming the deconstructionists of rock and roll.-Formation and first single:U.S...
, Erase Errata
Erase Errata
Erase Errata is a band from San Francisco, California. They often name experimentalists such as Captain Beefheart, The Fall, and the Minutemen as inspirations...
, Bobby Conn
Bobby Conn
Bobby Conn is an American musician based in Chicago, Illinois, known for his pop-rock. He often collaborates with other artists such as musicians Colby Starck and Jim O'Rourke, and film-maker Usama Alshaibi. In 2003, Conn produced a session for UK punk band The Cribs, whom he met when they were a...
, and Wolf Eyes
Wolf Eyes
Wolf Eyes is a post-industrial/noise band from Detroit, Michigan, United States.-History:Wolf Eyes began as a solo project of former Nautical Almanac member Nate Young, with Aaron Dilloway joining in 1998, and John Olson in 2000...
. Walter moved from Chicago to Oakland, California
Oakland, California
Oakland is a major West Coast port city on San Francisco Bay in the U.S. state of California. It is the eighth-largest city in the state with a 2010 population of 390,724...
in 2003, beginning yet another incarnation of the group. The live band played their final concert in November 2006. The Flying Luttenbachers project officially ceased operation in November 2007 upon the release of a final studio album (recorded solo by Walter).
Conceptual continuity
Since 1996’s Revenge album, the Flying Luttenbachers’ musical output has been underlined by a gradually unravelling storyline concerning the self-obliteration of the planet Earth and the resulting aftermath. The 2006 album Cataclysm concerns an interstellar battle between two monolithic entities: The Void (a dark, silent spectre detailed on 2004’s album of the same name) and The Iridescent Behemoth (a massive planetoid being whose tale was told on 2003’s complex Systems Emerge From Complete Disorder album). The music energetically utilizes deliberate harmonic dissonance and the material operates on a principle of intelligent transformation of concise amounts of interrelated themes.Singles
- 546 Seconds Of Noise 7" (Quinnah/ugEXPLODE, 1992, Quinnah 01/ug003)
- 1389 Seconds Of Noise 7" (Quinnah/ugEXPLODE, 1993, Quinnah 02/ug004)
Albums
- Live At WNUR 2-6-92 cassette/CD (ugEXPLODE/Coat-tail, 1992)
- Constructive Destruction LP/CD (ugEXPLODE/Quinnah, 1994)
- Destroy All Music LP/CD (Chimp/ugEXPLODE/Skin Graft, 1995)
- Revenge LP/CD (ugEXPLODE/Skin Graft, 1996)
- Live in the Middle East cassette (Chimp, 1996)
- Gods of Chaos CD (ugEXPLODE/Skin Graft, 1997)
- Retrospektiw III CD (ugEXPLODE/Quinnah, 1998)
- "...The Truth Is A Fucking Lie..." LP/CD (ugEXPLODE/Skin Graft, 1999)
- Alptraum CD (ugEXPLODE/Pandemonium, 2000)
- Trauma 2LP (ugEXPLODE, 2001)
- Infection and Decline LP/CD (ugEXPLODE/Troubleman Unlimited, 2002)
- Retrospektiw IV CD (ugEXPLODE/MNTCIA, 2002)
- Systems Emerge From Complete Disorder LP/CD (ugEXPLODE/Troubleman Unlimited, 2003)
- The Void LP/CD (ugEXPLODE/Troubleman Unlimited, 2004)
- Spectral Warrior Mythos Volume 1 CD (ugEXPLODE, 2005)
- Cataclysm CD (ugEXPLODE, 2006)
- Incarceration By Abstraction CD (ugEXPLODE, 2007)
Compilations
- Camp Skingraft 33 Hits! Now Wave Volumes 1-3 CD (Skin Graft Records, 1997, GR50)
- Hayfever EP No. 4 7" (Hayfever Magazine, 1997, #4)
- Knormalities 7" (Dephine Knormal Musik, 1998, DKM 03)
- Troubleman Mix-Tape 2xCD (Troubleman Unlimited, 2001, TMU-050)
- Troubleman 2003 Sampler CD (Troubleman Unlimited, 2003, TMU-109)