ABOUT FLAT EARTH - "Prefacipice".

FLAT EARTH was a progressive hard rock three-piece combo, the first band I was in with my dear friend Scott Cornette [we are currently members of the band Däng]. We wrote loud technical stuff, mainly for the challenge of being able to play it. In retrospect, our approach to the songs sometimes sounded like just frantically thrown-together sections of riffs, but framing pieces of music around my late great brother Mike Church's impressive drumming skills was a big reason for doing what we tried to do. To me it sometimes felt more like sports than music, but Mike and Scott were extremely talented, and the spirit of exploration was the only goal. I tried hard to just not drop the ball. Scott was an on-air guy at a successful rock radio station at the time, and we got in on opening a lot of regional shows. We opened for The Kinks, Blue Oyster Cult, Peter Frampton, Joan Jett, Kansas, Kings X, Billy Squier, Drivin N Cryin, Toad The Wet Sprocket, and more. We were well-received and achieved some near-miss status, but no management, no marketing and no clue meant no future in the 90s. We didn't pay attention to any of that stuff, and being an oddball mix of hard rock and awkward experimentation put us slightly out of place at nearly every turn...which was, of course, pure fun sometimes. It was a highlight when Dave Davies of The Kinks actually mentioned us in very positive comments on the nationally syndicated JohnBoy and Billy radio show the morning after we opened for them. Of course it is apropos of my nature that I don't remember exactly what he said. This is the first of two CDs we made, called "Prefacipice" (again, totally awkward, we thought it was cool to combine the words preface and precipice...or maybe that was just me...). A misprint from the CD manufacturers not only omitted our address (ensuring the complete inability of ever being contacted by anyone!!) but also placed a weird poem I wrote on the back case in place of the song titles, which were printed on the inside...so that a glance at this CD when it was new and in the shrink wrap provided no information AND extra obfuscation, a laughably hard luck par for a raggedy course. Our "Eleven Eleven" CD, the second and final FLAT EARTH record, would have a better fate technically and packaging-wise, but this first album showed a band that played like they really meant to figure out what was possible for them. I don't find myself relating to it much these days, and I haven't listened often over the years, but that's mostly about my extremely ponderous lyrics. I was always extremely proud of the noise we made. This remembrance is dedicated to my brother, the late great Mike Church {11-10-65/7-20-09}. -- Chris Church 8/28/18