Studio 52 is a community artist space located in the heart of Allston, and is proud to support the Boston music scene and local artist community.
For the past 10 years or so, The Fatal Flaw have been dishing out supercharged power-pop, a run that has provided one of the finest guitar-rock tracks to come out of Boston in that time (2012’s “You Need To Know”) and enough hooks to fill a season of Wicked Tuna.
This week, the gents are back with another piercing tune, a heartwarming track titled “Central Square,” and it doubles up as what the quartet calls a “pledge of allegiance to the Boston music scene.” Lyrically, the band pokes fun at its own draw, shouts-out that time-honored 2 a.m. drive home from the show, and offers some clever word play about one’s status in the scene by referencing the Middle East (“Some years you’re Up/Some years you’re Down”).
In fact, the Joel Reader’s lyrics here are so damn good, we’ve reprinted them in full after the Bandcamp embed below.
“Over the years we’ve noticed a steady stream of local bands leaving town for what they hope are greener pastures (invariably LA or New York),” The Fatal Flaw write, “with a few of the higher-profile defectors even taking the time to cast aspersions on their way out the door. (Gasp!) While we wish each and every one of them the best, this did cause us to reflect on our own place in the scene. And we realized that, come what may, we’re Boston lifers. With no illusions about being ‘discovered’ — and no expectations that we’re owed anything more — we’re content to simply still be standing, and still making music that we’re proud of. We’re lucky to have found a place where we belong.”
Helps when the music still slays, too.
“Central Square” is the first cut off The Fatal Flaw’s new record Older Now, which (we think) is the follow-up to 2011’s Narrow Hours. The record release party goes down September 9 at Great Scott in Allston. It’ll be a party, even if “barely 50 people” show up.
Featured Fatal Flaw photo by Joshua Pickering Photography.
The Fatal Flaw “Central Square”
Ain’t it a shame fortune and fame can’t seem to find us?
And isn’t it strange how few things change year after year
But the next time we headline
If you should jump on the Red Line
You’ll find us there in Central Square
And we’re not going nowhere
I will be there in Central Square if you should need me
I will be there, I will be there
Ain’t it shame and kinda lame
That barely fifty people came
But isn’t it true, these things we do, we do for love?
It’s the town we got lost in
But we won’t blame it on Boston
Yeah, this town ain’t fair
In Central Square at least we fit in somewhere
I will be there in Central Square if you should want me
Some years you’re Up, some years you’re Down.
But I can call it a good night
We remain and we fight the good fight
Caught in the snare that’s Central Square, year after year
I will be there in Central Square, so won’t you join me?
Come meet me there, come meet me there
And I can call it a good day, windows down
driving on the J-way at 2 a.m.
Back home again, year after year.
