Flummox Frontwoman Alyson Blake Dellinger Discusses ‘Southern Progress’

First impressions aren’t always the best impressions, and you may find that as you get to know Flummox. The hard rock band is not what you would typically expect from your average Southern stable of songwriters and instrumentalists. Hailing from Nashville, they refer to themselves as a queer, transfemme band that likes to rock out. Their new album is called Southern Progress, and it was just released on April 11th via Needlejuice Records. It can be described as a genre-hopping progressive thrash played at a mile a minute. Many of the songs were performed for audiences before they were actually recorded. Through almost constant touring and songwriting along the way, the band was able to test drive the songs. It helped them decide what worked and what didn’t rather than work that out in a recording studio.

The album’s release was preceded by its first single, “Southern Progress.” The song, and the album, discuss growing up queer in a fundamentalist culture that is so prevalent in the American South. Connected to this, the songs also delve into apathy, depression, and dealing with buried trauma. But part of the purpose of the record is to discuss how to go about undoing some of that trauma. Part of the process is just writing about it and dealing with it head-on. A big part of the reason Flummox play and writes together is to hash out their feelings. They view songwriting as a type of therapy, both for themselves and hopefully their listeners.

Alyson Blake Dellinger joins us today to discuss Southern Progress, working with Needlejuice, important influences, and more.

Tell us about your new record, Southern Progress. What was your experience making it, and what went on behind the scenes?

Alyson Blake Dellinger: “This album was a difficult birth, but also a very cathartic and fulfilling experience. Some of these songs we started writing during the initial quarantine era of the pandemic, with some pieces of songs even being recycled from things I wrote over a decade ago. It’s not a concept album, but there are certainly some recurring themes and conceptual continuity going on with it. A lot of it has to do with growing up queer in a fundamentalist background in the South and how that impacted me well into adulthood. There are also topics of apathy, depression and coping with one’s neurodivergence as it both adds to and hinders the creative process.

“Once we got the selection of songs nice and tight, we hit up our pal Jason Dietz about recording at his Twin Oak Studios in Murfreesboro, Tennessee. Dietz is a figurehead in our community, and it’s almost a rite of passage to record with him if you’re a Bucket City band. We primarily did the rhythm tracks with him, and once that was finished, we went on tour for a bit. However, he was on tour with Amigo the Devil when we were preparing to track vocals and extra instrumentation, so I texted (Judas Priest guitarist) Richie Faulkner about potentially using his home studio as a last-minute alternative. Luckily, he was in town and was totally down with letting us use his space to get that chunk of the album recorded!

“After that, we toured even more heavily with recording and mixing happening concurrently whenever we could manage it. The band had a lot of personal life things happen during that time, which delayed our progress. Since (guitarist) Chase McCutcheon and (guitarist) Max Mobarry were the only ones really editing and mixing it in the interim between shows and work, it really limited how much could get done at a time. That said, with that kind of time being taken, we were able to really focus on making something more quality than if we had been forced to keep a strict deadline. Our label Needlejuice was more than accommodating on that front, but I think we all agreed to let someone else mix the next one as a result!”

Flummox ‘Southern Progress’ album artwork

What’s the story behind the name of the new record?

“Southern Progress, simply put, is just the idea that the old South will not rise again, but will instead rise anew. The tornado on the album cover represents the destruction of the old South and how it will eventually be swept away by nature; leaving room for something more beautiful and strong to take its place. The opossum fighting the snake is just a visual representation of the marginalized struggling with their oppressor while still being resilient to its venom, eventually devouring the serpent that tried to overcome it. Opossums are an animal commonly associated with the South. It’s also our mascot, and it just so happens that opossums are immune to snake venom of all kinds.”

How did you link up with your label Needlejuice, and what about them was attractive enough to make you sign?

“Needlejuice signed us back in 2019 to release our first real album, Intellectual Hooliganism, on vinyl, which they remastered and re-released again a couple of years back. Someone had turned them onto our more independent 2018 release of the CD, and they were intrigued from that moment on. We’ve been with them ever since, and they’ve let us get away with whatever we want. They’re not afraid of letting us be as weird and queer as possible, and we appreciate them for backing us on that.”

How would you describe your own music?

“Genrefluid. That’s the most succinct way I can put it.”

Who are your biggest influences?

“The two biggest artists that made me want to do music when I was young were Black Sabbath and Weird Al Yankovic, which kind of explains a lot. I still think Black Sabbath is the greatest band of all time; they’re probably the closest thing I have to a deity. Later in my teen years, I started to get heavily into Frank Zappa, Mr. Bungle, Primus, Sleepytime Gorilla Museum, and weirdos like that, as well as extreme metal stuff like Celtic Frost, Triptykon, Warbringer, Slayer, Morbid Saint, and that sort of thing.

“I’m also super influenced by more theatrical acts, whether that be the original Alice Cooper band or the works of Stephen Sondheim. Nowadays, my musical palette has a much larger range. When preparing for this new record, I was listening to a lot of Sloppy Jane, Black Midi, Illuminati Hotties, Cardiacs, Ember Knight, and Imperial Triumphant.”

Flummox @ the bech in Jacksonville, FL

Flummox @ The Pillars in El Paso, TX

Do you have any touring plans in support of the new record?

“Lots of plans! We’re about to hit the road with Mac Sabbath for close to a month. We’re starting in Texas and making our way east and up the coast from there before eventually ending in Chicago. After a couple of regional gigs, we plan on hitting the Pacific Northwest in July and maybe a festival date or two somewhere in all that.”

Do you have any rituals before you hit the stage?

“Arguably, most of our rituals happen on stage! We’re very theatrical, and we perform mock infant sacrifice rituals on stage from time to time when the mood is right. Sometimes I dress like an opossum and chuck myself into trash cans from the stage: sometimes there’s nudity. Other times, the rest of the band dons pig masks and runs into the audience mid-song to beg for slop while personifying various stages of grief. I’d say that’s all pretty ritualistic if we’re talking in the sense of chaos magick.”

What’s the strangest thing that’s happened to you on tour, or at one of your shows?

“Well, considering our stage antics, it’s hard to pinpoint exactly one thing. We’re kind of known for being the strangest thing that’s happened to people at a show ourselves. However, the show one December where I threw on a Santa Claus beard and hat, pulled my top off and started crying while smearing red and green paint that created a brownish mixture on my breasts with my band pointing and laughing at me the whole time comes to mind.”

What’s the best criticism you’ve ever received about your music or performance?

“‘Stop that!’ I can’t really blame them, really.”

What do you like most about playing music?

“It’s just always been the best medium for me to get my weird little ideas out as well as cope with my surroundings using my hands to make loud noises. For years, it was the only thing I had to make sense of the world because it wasn’t like my parents ever took me to a psychiatrist as a kid, and once I was an adult, it was all I knew for some time. Luckily for me and the general public, I’m medicated now, but unfortunately for them, that hasn’t stopped me from making music about it. I’ll never stop as long as my body allows it.

“There’s no feeling like being on a stage and making the audience react to the way me and my friends make the air wiggle. It’s the best feeling there is in this world to me.”

Flummox @ The Basement in East Nashville, photo by Hannah Laney