How Flickerstick Got Back Together and Made Their Best Album to Date

Fort Worth-based psychedelic pop-rock band Flickerstick has released its third and most accomplished album to date, Superluminal, now available on all major music streaming services. In celebration of the Nov. 7 release, Flickerstick will headline the Granada Theater on Nov. 29 for a record release party with openers Rosegarden Funeral Party. 

Along with Tripping Daisy, Toadies and Drowning Pool, Flickerstick may be considered one of the last bona fide legacy Dallas rock bands to exist, their music defining a rare time in DFW when people were genuinely excited about Deep Ellum music in a way that seemed more organic and natural than forced. Like the other juggernauts of the time, Flickerstick developed a real culture around their band, often building rotating bills with other incredible bands such as Hi-Fi Drowning, Chomsky and Doosu, keeping the rock clubs of Deep Ellum packed with stylish twenty-somethings, all wearing vintage clothes, drinking vodka Red Bulls and singing along with every word. Flickerstick singer Brandin Lea often took to the mic at the end of shows encouraging the large crowd to support his personal choice of local favorites in an effective attempt to keep Dallas bands landing record deals from serious labels. 

After winning a VH1 reality show, in 2001, Flickerstick signed a record deal with Sony/Epic Records, releasing a remixed version of their first album titled Welcoming Home the Astronauts, originally recorded with Todd Pipes of Deep Blue Something. The album was popular for its interplay of guitar melodies and synthesizers, featuring soaring, catchy vocal lines that spawned the radio single, “Beautiful.” Later that year, the band embarked on a major tour in support of the album, but ran into trouble when they found themselves playing a showcase in New York City on Sept. 11, 2001, a day they would never forget.

Following the music industry meltdown of the early 2000s, Flickerstick emerged from the fallout, releasing their next full-length album, Tarantula, in 2004 on Dallas-based Idol Records. The album was recently reissued by the label on orange and pink vinyl in 2024. Where Welcoming Home the Astronauts was polished, Tarantula was gritty; where one had vocal melody, the other had intensity. Following several tours in support of Tarantula and the exit of Dominic Weir and founding member and guitarist Cory Kreig in 2005, Flickerstick disbanded in 2007, with each member embarking on different projects. Singer Brandin Lea formed Jetta in the Ghost Tree.

Flickerstick Reunites in 2022 at House of Blues

However, in 2022, with the help of friends, acquaintances, social media fan pages and a possible miracle, Flickerstick’s original lineup, including Brandin Lea, Cory Kreig, Fletcher Lea, Domonic Weir and Rex Ewing, reunited for two sold-out nights at the House of Blues Dallas. At the packed shows, fans were treated to the knowledge that Flickerstick had decided to open a new chapter in the band’s history, moving forward now with the addition of longtime drummer Todd Harwell, bassist Fatima Thomas and guitarist Beau Wagener. At first, a new single was announced and released in 2022 titled “Shine On,” and then rumors of a new full-length album started to circulate, culminating in Superluminal.

“I didn’t think that we would make another record,” Lea says. “That reunion show was all we were going to do, then Cory came up with the idea that I would reform the band. When we did that, we decided we needed a new record.”

Superluminal consists of eleven tracks which exude sophistication, complexity, hooks, juxtaposing textures and lyrical compositions that are the apex of hard work, skillful writing and a true creative achievement for any band. The artistry, balance and sonic presence the album holds surpass all previous work in a way that is elusive for a band like Flickerstick to achieve after so many years away from the craft. Superluminal is also proof that great songwriting, skilled musicianship and melody are what make a song, an album and a band epic. Standout tracks such as “Champagne Lips,” “Diver” and “Lonely Girl” will have Flickerstick fans in goosebumps. The former suits at Sony/Epic Records (who let them get away) should come to the stark realization that the only taste they possess may be limited to their collective mouths. Simply put, Superluminal is way overdue and absolutely brilliant. 

Flickerstick Breaks New Ground

“I didn’t know I could do it,” Lea says. “There was a good possibility of failure on this thing. It had been 20 years since we did a Flickerstick album and twelve years since I did Jetta. We worked on it for six months, and basically, I made demos and sent them to the band. I wrote 20 songs for the album, and we wound up using about nine of them.”

Considering the imaginative spaces the album explores, it’s hard to imagine Flickerstick’s historiography now without the album. Despite faint references to Welcoming Home the Astronauts, Lea’s lyrical prose breaks new ground, as the singer has clearly matured into creating complex and critical poetics in response to the world of the mid-2020s.

“It was really about going back to the bare bones of it all,” Lea says. “Lyrical content was way different because I’m not in my 20s anymore. Astronauts is an optimistic record written by a young man. Tarantula was [written] after 9/11, the chaos and demons out there, and Superluminal is about the passing of time. It’s a concept record about getting older, asking questions and running out of time, and it’s also a very concerned record.” 

For new guitarist Beau Wagener, a longtime musician, fan and friend of Flickerstick, his contribution to Superluminal consisted of two tracks, “Compromise” and “Noriega.” Both songs embody Wagener’s signature angular guitar motions recognizable from other significant projects the guitarist has been involved in such as [DARYL] and The Crash that Took Me, along with Flickerstick bassist Fatima Thomas. 

“From the jump, I was conscious of where I fit in,” Wagener says. “I was always comfortable with them and loved the band my whole life. While sifting through song ideas, I felt much more at ease contributing to the whole process. Rex is also a great lead player, and we both like sonics and layers, so it felt very natural exploring that together. We all had a lot of fun, and I’m very happy with the end result.”

Flickerstick co-founder and former lead guitarist, Cory Krieg, also contributed a track to the new album, which is currently receiving radio play on KXT 91.7’s Homegrown Music Show.

“Cory wrote ‘Your Heart is a Fortress,’ Lea says. “He sent me a demo of him with an acoustic guitar and I played everything on the demo, and the song went from there.”

Krieg was responsible for a significant part of the Flickerstick story, as he and Lea co-wrote many of the band’s early songs, which were later compiled into Welcoming Home the Astronauts. The former guitarist’s influence on the album is evident in nearly every song, despite his brief but significant contribution.

The new album was recorded with Michael Smith at Sunland Studios in Dallas and mixed by Nolan Theis in New York City. Smith, a multi-instrumentalist and relatively young producer for such a high-profile project, had seen Flickerstick as a teenager and was excited to work with the band on their much-anticipated comeback album. For Smith, making the band comfortable in the studio was paramount to the success of the recording sessions. After an initial meeting with Lea and Wagener, he was enlisted to both record and produce the album, and also contributed synthesizers to the final mixes. 

“Beau casually mentioned back in 2023 that they wanted to do the record at my place,” Smith says. “He had brought it up, and I told him that I was definitely interested. They put a lot of trust in me, and thankfully, I got along really well with everybody, and that’s really important to me. As a producer, I want to make sure that the musicians are comfortable, inspired and able to give a good performance. We’ve always got time, and I think we were able to capture that larger-than-life sound that I witnessed as a teenager.”

Through Smith’s efforts, the band was able to both distill and refine their signature sound, as synthesizers, along with Thomas and Harwell’s rhythm section, provide a flawless padding to enhance both Ewing and Wagener’s swirling guitars under Lea’s soaring vocals. That being said, Superluminal just may be the record that catapults Smith and Sunland Studios into the spotlight as one of Dallas’s premier recording studios, although the space is situated in a building behind the producer’s home. 

“I’ve known Michael for a very long time,” Wagener says. “I was really excited when he started doing production work because he’s always been fantastic at everything he does. It’s a gift in life to be playing music with your friends and heroes and I’m glad to be part of it.”

For Flickerstick frontman Lea, he couldn’t agree more with Wagener regarding the meaning behind the creation of Superluminal and the process of making arguably the band’s best album to date.

“Every day that this band plays anything, doing it for the second time, I’ve realized how special it really is,” Lea says. “For people to get together and make music, and to make a record the way that we did, it’s just all that I really know how to do. I want people to know that we just made our best record and that I’m just happy to still be doing it with this band.”

Flickerstick will also be featured in an upcoming documentary from independent filmmaker Crystal Vasquez. Superluminal will be made available on both vinyl and CD formats.