The Orpheum presents Wonderlick [
https://www.wonderlick.com/], on Sunday, August 3rd, 2025 at the historic Orpheum Theater in downtown Flagstaff, AZ
ALL AGES | DOORS: 6:30PM | SHOW: 7PM
* THIS SHOW IS PRESENTED IN THE ORPHEUM LOUNGE *
More on the Artist:
Woody Guthrie famously scrawled, “This machine kills fascists” on his acoustic guitar back in 1943, but can musicians really hope to offer any effective resistance to encroaching authoritarianism in 2025?
Wonderlick Goes to War is Jay Blumenfield and Tim Quirk’s attempt to answer that question. Its eleven songs explore the amazing feats human beings have accomplished, as well as the disturbing lows they regularly sink to, and attempts to connect the dots between individual frustrations and the collective horrors that can arise from them.
It’s also catchy as hell, as all Wonderlick records strive to be. Drums pound, guitars wail, synthesizers bubble and hooks abound, helped along this time by the participation of producer Dave Trumfio (a member of Pulsars and the Mekons, whose numerous engineering and production credits include Wilco and Built to Spill), whom the duo enlisted to help them realize their vision.
As singer and lyricist Tim Quirk explains it, “I wanted ‘Vinko Bogataj’ to sound like a Pulsars song, but we couldn’t quite get the rhythm tracks right. I was Facebook friends with Dave, so I sent him a message asking if he’d be up for spending a weekend in the studio with us. I sent him a link to our last LP, Undisciplined, and he wrote back really quickly, ‘SONGS!!!’ So I knew we’d get along.”
The results from that initial weekend were so inspiring the trio agreed to complete an entire album together. Wonderlick were impressed by Dave’s dedication. “We tend to bang things out quickly and move right on. But Dave will spend hours on every part, comping multiple takes together until he’s convinced it’s perfect. He did it with his own bass parts as much as with either of our vocals. He basically became an equal member of the band for this album.”
Wonderlick Goes to War is the band’s fifth full-length LP. Their self-titled debut came out on Future Farmer in 2002. Neither that record nor the band itself had been planned, really – the very first song they recorded as a duo was done merely so they could have something new to offer fans of their then-dormant group, pop-punk pioneers Too Much Joy, when they belatedly set up a TMJ website in 2000. They called themselves Wonderlick in honor of the reclusive rock star Bucky Wunderlich from Don DeLillo’s Great Jones Street, gave that first song away as a free download, and were stunned when the PayPal tip jar they’d added to the website as an afterthought earned them more in the first 24 hours than they’d made through Warner Brothers the entire time they’d been signed to that label.
The rush from that experience led Tim and Jay to commit to recording and releasing one new Wonderlick song a month for the rest of that year. The results didn’t sound very much like their previous work. The SF Chronicle described the final album as, “sparse, startlingly beautiful,” and said it “unfolds like a fractured tone poem, swirling with layered harmonies and vocoder effects, guitar and drum loops, found sounds and samples.” Future releases saw the duo continuing to vary their musical approach and distribution methods: Topless at the Arco Arena (2009) was a bonafide rock opera while Super (2015) began life as a mobile app. Undisciplined (2024) was recorded in two furious weekend sessions. Wonderlick Goes to War was mostly written on the road last summer, when Wonderlick undertook a cross country tour of house concerts.
“Those house shows were revelatory,” Quirk explains. “They’re small by definition – I think the largest one had maybe 50 attendees – but the impact each one had on us, and on the audience, felt massive. So a lot of the songs we wrote on the road wound up exploring that kind of dynamic, where tiny individual choices or actions can wind up having global consequences, for good or for evil.”
“Tiny lights in massive darkness,” Jay adds, quoting a lyric from the album’s final song, “Origin Story.” “That’s what we’re trying to be. That’s what these songs are.”
------------------------------
The Orpheum Theater is a historic, indoor venue located on Aspen Street in downtown Flagstaff next to the Weatherford Hotel and Residence Inn.
* Parking is not available on site. Find info on street and garage parking here [
https://orpheumflagstaff.com/getting-here/].
* Tickets are the same price at the box office and online
* A Full Bar is available at the venue
* No outside food and beverage is allowed in
* Empty, soft, clear water bottles will be allowed. No hydro flasks, metal, or hard plastic water bottles of any kind will be permitted inside the venue.
* Backpacks larger than 10 x 14″ will not be allowed into the venue
* Unless specifically stated by the show, venue has a strict no re-entry policy
For a complete list of Permitted & Prohibited Items click here [
https://orpheumflagstaff.com/permitted-prohibited-items/]
Where to Stay in Flagstaff [
https://orpheumflagstaff.com/where-to-stay/]
Accessibility [
https://orpheumflagstaff.com/accessibility/]
FAQ [
https://orpheumflagstaff.com/faq/]
Also check out other Music events in Flagstaff, Entertainment events in Flagstaff, Arts events in Flagstaff.
