Foto-© Amanda Laferriere
Heute erscheint mit Burnout Days das neue Album der US-amerikanischen Band flipturn! Auf dem 12-Song-Album kehrt das Indie-Rock-Kraftpaket als Klangarchitekten zurück, die ihr beeindruckendes Gespür für Hooks und schimmernde Klanglandschaften unter Beweis stellen. Burnout Days enthält einige ihrer bisher intimsten und kathartischsten Songs und erzählt von den Stunden, die sie in Vans, Green Rooms und auf der Bühne verbracht haben, während sie ihr Leben mit Mitte 20 und die ständigen Drehungen und Wendungen einer Branche meisterten, die alles andere als mitfühlend sein kann. „Burnout Days fühlt sich an wie ein weiterer Vorstoß in das, was unser Sound sein kann, während wir gleichzeitig mit unseren Wurzeln vertraut bleiben“, sagt Leadsängers Dillon Basse. „Einige der Themen, die erforscht werden und die ich neu für flipturn finde, sind toxische Positivität, Burnout und die Akzeptanz von ständigem Wandel… Es ist das ehrlichste, was wir unserem Publikum gegenüber über das Leben der letzten Jahre gesagt haben.“
Sänger und Gitarrist Basse hat für uns zum heutigen Release des neuen flipturn-Albums ein Track by Track mit allem Wissenswerten zu den Songs geschrieben!
1. Juno
Juno is a song that actually came about by accident. When we were on our writing trip last summer Mitch dropped his Juno (JU-06A) by accident but when it hit the ground it somehow created a brand new patch and a sound that everyone loved. We loved it so much that it instantly turned into the opening riff of the song.
Lyrically, we wanted to tell a story about what life can feel like traveling the country as a band in a transit van. Our van Pegasus, “Peggy” for short, really became the closest thing to home we had when touring. A lot of our family and friends for years would assume that the rockstar lifestyle was how they saw it in movies or pop culture but in reality it is a much different experience. It truly is an insane thing to do and you kind of have to be a little delusional to do it. Juno also is meant to highlight the toxic positivity that I think we’ve all experienced when we feel like we need to tell our friends and family “we’re living the dream” when we are still very much chasing the dream.

2. Rodeo Clown
Rodeo Clown is the first story we’re sharing from our second LP. When we started working on this song last July, I remember thinking the chorus had this floating feel to it. In simple terms it’s a song about coping with stresses through a vice but more specifically, it’s a story about using MDMA, a drug that evokes a feeling of false confidence and warmth or “floating” in my experience, as a way to escaping a reality I didn’t want to be in at the time. Contrary to “the man in the arena”, the rodeo clown in the ring distracts and puts on a show for those around him.
The song portrays the use of drugs as a means of escapism, highlighting the ephemeral nature of euphoria and the weight of emotional burdens. The Rodeo Clown metaphor suggests playing a role to hide true feelings, emphasizing the dichotomy between outward appearances and internal struggles.

3. Inner Wave
This is a song to me that really just feels like coming up on a drug both lyrically and sonically. The funny thing about when artists/musicians change as people is that no matter how much they change, throughout their career they are forced to constantly come back to a certain image or sound that they once portrayed. I had been reading a lot of Alan Watts before this record because I felt as though I was having some identity issues and problems related to who I was as an artist/ human being now versus who I’ve been in my past. Reading Watts’s words about “the self” and security and what identity even is led me to want to write about my own personal experience with it all… that and some help from some magic mushrooms.

4. Sunlight
Sunlight might be the most personal and honest song I’ve written lyrically. I started writing words for it the day my mom had to be driven to rehab again by my little sister. I wanted to tell a story of acceptance of those closest to us for who they are because ultimately they are the people shaping us and changing us the most.
My mom took up growing bonsais when she got home from rehab as a hobby to help prevent her from drinking. She would also recite and preach to us the serenity prayer. “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, Courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference”.
That’s really where the idea for the rest of the song came from. Like a bonsai tree’s branches needing to be cut in order for it to grow, human beings also need to be pruned in order to grow, even if it hurts like a mother fucker.

5. Moon Rocks
This is at its core a song about two friends smoking on a porch, thinking yet again they’ve “figured some shit out” the higher they get. It is also a story of venting and getting some things off one’s chest. I forget where I heard this but I once heard someone say “the reason people think smoking calms them down is because it forces them to take deep breaths”. Whether that’s true or not I wanted to write a song about late night talks with your friends and taking some deep breaths.

6. Right?
This is likely the most existential song on the album. All the songs on the album I feel came from experiences with burnout or coping, but this was one specifically that came from the question “I’m doing this shit and taking my part in the rat race for something… right?

7. Window
With every pun intended Window is a song about opening up. More specifically though, it’s a song that tries to beat the cliche of someone who’s been burned by opening up in the past.
When we were writing this song I was in this strange in-between stage of getting to know my current partner after having left my past relationship. I make a living off of being vulnerable so I would never call myself a closed person, but because of my past relationship it was the first time I was a little hesitant to give myself up to someone. Window was just a small piece of growing past a new fear and truly being vulnerable again.

8. Swim Between Trees
Lyrically, just some words I wrote about the woman in my life that I’ve learned so much from. She keeps me grounded and yet makes me feel like I can be or do anything I want. She’s seen me in the moments I’m most confident and feeling like I can conquer the fucking world and she’s seen that same person become a shell of themselves.

9. Tides
At the time of writing this record, most of us lived together in a house on the St. John’s River in Jacksonville. Every day the river looks a little different, and we love sitting out on the dock watching the tides change and wildlife that stops by (manatees, bald eagles, dolphins, gators, herons, just to name a few). The river works as a point of introspection and is a great place to think about life and things of our pasts.
A tape delay effect organically sounded like cicadas and fits perfectly with the setting for the song.
A song written looking out at the world outside our house on the river in Jacksonville and seeing the flow of nature realizing the world isn’t going in any direction in particular. It’s just going.

10. Reason to Pretend
A song that really does the opposite of every other song lyrically on the record. It was the one song written out of pure angst rather than understanding. The line “You love me a healthy amount” is said in a frustrated manner because this is a song about wanting that obsessive over the top love with someone.

11. If It Is
At the time we wrote this one I had just started going to therapy for the first time. It was through therapy I learned a lot about myself including the fact that I was a very codependent person. This is a song that acts as a confession and simultaneously a warning from a codependent person to anyone that they might be involved in saying “if this is just what it’s always been”… RUN!

12. Burnout Days
We decided to name the album and also wrap it up with this song in particular because it was the most hopeful outlook on the side effects of burnout. The inspiration came when I met my current partner. I have always had a hard time letting myself enjoy life because I was constantly wanting more, never truly felt satisfied with where I was and who I was, and honestly sometimes just didn’t think I deserved to enjoy it at times. She slowed everything down and for the first time I wasn’t denying the feeling of burnout but embracing it as just another chapter in my life that I was going to grow from.
In broader terms though dealing with burnout as a band made us realize and appreciate the people in our lives that loved us no matter what. Chasing this dream we’ve always had has led us to leave the people we care about constantly. With no guarantee of actually achieving it they still support us because they love us and they know how much we love what we do.
