Dan Flegg is a journalist, singer, guitarist and one half of alternative rock powerhouse Baam Bam. The band has quickly gained notoriety around their harbourside hometown of Newcastle, NSW, packing out rooms with high-energy sets crawling with earworm melodies. It’s not uncommon for Dan to stride into the audience, slinging his electric guitar like a man possessed, breaking the fourth wall with a sledgehammer. He and drummer Stu Moppett conjure a raucous brand of voodoo. With a swag of seismic tunes in their tool bag, many of them already crowd favourites, Baam Bam has wasted no time in hitting the studio, working with coveted Byron Bay producer Jordan Power, Newcastle recording engineer Sean Cook of Novotone Studios and mastering guru Andrew Edgson of Studios 301.
The first recorded taste of Baam Bam is debut single ‘Schweetums’, a blistering rock song that typifies the pair’s approach. “Every now and then when Stu and I are in the studio, we’ll come in with no preconceived ideas and have a song that is nearly ready to go by the end of it. That song was exactly that. It immediately flowed out. Other than the lyrics, the guitar and drums was done in two hours.”
Moppett says: “The intro has this ‘60s beat. It seems to suit the song but it’s different to our others – it’s a throwback to a rock ‘n’ roll-style of playing rather than our more angsty, heavier stuff. It just seemed to work. It was literally the first beat I started playing when Dan started with that riff.”
Dan’s lyrics are often incisive observations of relationships, teeth pulled from the skull of human behaviour. On ‘Schweetums’ the rocker lances our judgemental tendencies. “People have an inclination to point out problems with other people’s relationships and the world, but more often than not they don’t look at their own relationships,” he says. “They’re very willing to judge others before judging themselves.”
Baam Bam will release new material in 2023 - until then you can catch Dan reading the national news for the Triple M and Hit networks.