On Oct. 16, 2020, Flow Tribe will release their third full-length studio album, entitled “Lotería Cósmica,” on Bubble Bath Records. The album’s title translates to “cosmic lottery,” or the great game of chance that is life. If any band has experienced the full spectrum of fortune and adversity, it is the six members of Flow Tribe.
Founded in 2004, the band was formed in the wake of Hurricane Katrina’s destruction. The next 15 years would find Flow Tribe on a non-stop tour, criss-crossing the country multiple times over, and performing 150+ shows a year. The band performed everywhere from the biggest festival stages to some of America’s darkest dive bars and freak shows.
Flow Tribe’s members, according to an interview in 2017 with OffBeat’s John Wirt, are all products of Catholic schools in New Orleans, who grew up with local music. Louis Armstrong, Louis Prima and Kermit Ruffins, R&B and funk classics of the 1950s, ’60s and ’70s, and hip-hop hits released by Cash Money Records in the 1990s and 2000s, inspired the music-crazy kids who formed the band.
Singer-trumpeter K.C. O’Rorke told OffBeat, “Growing up in New Orleans, we lived in dual worlds. You’re raised on Dr. John, the Meters, Rebirth Brass Band, Allen Toussaint, Irma Thomas—those classic New Orleans figures. But we also heard national talent. We liked Sublime and the Red Hot Chili Peppers. And then the local rappers with Cash Money Records blew up at the national level. For years, Lil Wayne and Mannie Fresh were the biggest names in hip-hop. It was crazy seeing videos with all these girls backing it up in City Park. There’s always a period in time when New Orleans bubbles up to the surface in the national consciousness.”
The release of 2017’s “BOSS,” produced by hip-hop hit maker Mannie Fresh, reached #53 on Billboard’s R&B Hot 100 Chart. Recording “BOSS” inspired the band to build their own studio and establish a hub for creativity for the New Orleans music community. The latest album was recorded at Downman Sounds Studio, their home base and headquarters.
After working in multiple studios with various producers over the years, this album shows a new approach for the band — writing, engineering, and producing an album completely by their own hands. The tracks themselves reflect the diversity of sounds that inspire these lifelong musical journeymen. From the straight-up-the-gut-rock of “Grown Man Fall,” to the country twang of “Rub a Little Dirt (In Your Heart),” the album unites stylistically different songs around the central themes of love, loss, and the search for meaning in an unpredictable cosmos.
The band has grown up on the road. Each live set during the past decade and a half has compacted another strata of experience into the band’s uncanny resilience and longevity. “Lotería Cósmica” demonstrates Flow Tribe in full maturation mode at the height of their creativity. A career of triumphs and hard knocks animates a sound described as “bizzarely irresitable” by Relix Magazine. The album invites the listener to embrace the karmic dance. Especially when life steps on your toes.
To stream the album Friday, visit the band’s website.
