Introducing The Flying Luttenbachers: Support Living Artists

The Flying Luttenbachers, the free-jazz/punk/noise instrumental project led by Oakland drummer Weasel Walter, has called it quits after 16 years.

Still scratching your head over that last sentence? No worries. Despite numerous albums and lineups throughout the years, the Luttenbachers have been kicking out their electrifying and, admittedly, inaccessible style of music in relative obscurity.

The Luttenbachers combine the melodic complexity of King Crimson, pounding rhythm of Black Flag and dissonance of Krzysztof Penderecki, (you still with me?), and, led by Walter’s tight percussion, fuse these otherwise unmixable styles into an explosive listening experience. Check out this insane promo video:



The Luttenbachers’ MySpace page has some excellent cuts from their later albums, including their last release, Incarceration by Abstraction. The Luttenbachers’ back catalog is available on ugEXPLODE Records.

Unfortunately, Walter’s retirement of the Luttenbachers reflects how difficult it is to cultivate an audience for such a challenging sub-genre of music.

“I guess what I was trying to prove is that nothing could stop the band. That's not a very good reason to have a band, honestly,” wrote Walter on the Luttenbachers’ website. “Perhaps if I feel like a wider audience is ready for it, we'll reappear, but until then we've done all we can do. Any more would be quixotic and futile.”

Perhaps the real lesson lies in the phrase at the top of the Luttenbachers’ MySpace page, which could serve as the epitaph for every uncompromising musical group in America :

“SUPPORT LIVING ARTISTS - DON'T TAKE GREAT MUSIC FOR GRANTED”

- Matt Squire, Senior Contributing Editor and "Purveyor of Insanely Great, Obscure Music"