The following text was written by Bob Mehr, music critic for the Chicago Reader. He tells our story better than we do, so read on: Their story sounds like some well-contrived publicity yarn: The left-handed guitarist who plays with his instrument strung upside down; the imposing punk veteran who sings spot-on Appalachian harmonies and drums like a mad dervish; a small army of gifted, outlandish bass players who’ve come and gone with a Spinal Tappish frequency. Remarkably, though, it’s not fiction; it’s Flathead. To music fans outside the Grand Canyon state, Phoenix’s Flathead is more a legend than a band. A musical fixture in the desert for more than a decade, Flathead have rarely toured outside their native southwest. Yet their brand of blazing boom-chicka country, fevered roadhouse, and impeccably crafted catalog of trad inspired tunes have made them one of the most significant, if overlooked, roots acts to emerge from Arizona in a generation.“What you have here is straight-up country, bluegrass, rig-rock and all that clean ‘60s and early ‘70s pickin.’ It’s all side by side and it’s badass.”