Jazz Hands

Flap! began quite spontaneously. An informal jam between friends at the Port Fairy Folk Festival in 2007 proved more rewarding than anticipated. With that, they were a band. Since then, they've grown to embrace that sense of energetic spontaneity throughout all of their work. Their songs are delivered at breakneck speed. They tour constantly. And, to date, they're still not entirely sure what genre they play.

“I didn't take it particularly seriously when we first started. What really made it fantastic was that some of Jess [Guille – vocals]'s songs were so great. When things started going well and the audience started reacting well, it was just a wonderful thing to see,” trumpet player and vocalist Eamon McNelis reflects.

Typically, they're considered a jazz band. McNelis actually won a National Jazz Award in 2010. Their 2012 album A Great Day For The Race recently won the Australian Jazz Bell Award for Best Traditional Jazz Album. Except their music isn't really jazz. It's influenced by certain strands of it, certainly, but it's influenced by tropicalia, folk, pop, rock and gypsy music as well. They're hard to pin down.

“Being called a jazz band doesn't really bother me. I mean, I am a jazz musician. I just don't think we really are a jazz band,” McNelis says. “The way that I define jazz is that the forms of the music are improvised whereas our forms are much more set. We're more of a sort of a rock'n'roll band that happens to sound like a jazz band. Audiences don't really seem to have a problem with it.

“You know, people who have heard the albums or seen the live show have generally been quite receptive. It's when we go to a manager or a booking agent or a festival booker and they hear that we're some sort of jazz band. Then, you get a lot of, 'Oh, we don't do that sort of thing',” he says, laughing. “So, I suppose it's not the most commercially viable label. Still, it's going to be said... we're pretty jazzy.”

Contrary to their superficial reputation, their appeal is actually quite broad. More than anything else, Flap! are a fun band. Their high-velocity songs are witty and infectious. Their style carries with it an irresistible sense of exoticism. Awards and instrumentation may suggest a stuffy jazz band – but it's their unstoppable touring that really defines their appeal. It's no surprise they'll be supporting The Cat Empire's European tour, for example.

“You know, pretty much everyone in this band is in five or six other bands as well. I think most of those bands play once a month – whereas we're currently playing four or five times a month,” McNelis laughs. “Everything's been really good. We're playing some wonderful shows. We're heading off around Australia for the next month, then we're off to Europe for a month and then a couple of weeks later we're off to Europe again with The Cat Empire.

“We've put a lot of work in, played a lot of shows, done a lot of paperwork. Going to Europe is a massive thing to organise. I can't believe I agreed to do it again. A thousand things to pay attention to and that constant fear that you're going to miss the one crucial detail,” he laughs again. “Like I said, things are going really well.”