VIA PRESS RELEASE | Los Angeles power pop/punks Flyboys and Frontier Records, Sun Valley’s premiere punk rock label since 1980, announced today the release of the definitive collection, The Complete Flyboys 1978-1980 on April 10, 2026.
The 14-track, digitally remastered album contains the band’s first, self-titled EP—Frontier Records’ first release in March 1980—now expanded to include seven tracks making their LP and CD debut: Both songs from Flyboys’ second 7” single (“Square City”/”Crayon World”) plus five previously unreleased demos from 1979. The album will be released on limited-edition white vinyl, compact disc, and digital streaming and is now available for pre-order from indie distributor, Independent Label Distribution.
Pasadena’s Flyboys were a power pop/punk band that began in 1977 with singer/songwriter John Curry and Jim “Trash” Decker from The Crowd (and tangentially, Jay from The Simpletones, who would later sign to Posh Boy). Flyboys gigged all over the Southland, paying their dues opening for every national and local punk band from Huntington Beach to Hollywood. They were anything but typical punks with their day-glo clothes, Cuban heels, and maddeningly catchy songs. Infectious hooks and John Curry’s bleached-blonde pompadour were the band’s trademarks.
Lisa Fancher interviewed Flyboys when she was a rock scribe at the Los Angeles Herald Examiner. The band’s lack of traction in the LA scene gave her the notion to finance an EP with the band and release it herself. The recording began in 1979 at Leon Russell’s Paradise Studios in North Hollywood, California (where Concrete Blonde’s Johnette Napolitano was the receptionist) with Jim Mankey (from the original Sparks) as the engineer and Dickies’ manager Scott Goddard as producer.
The EP took far too long to record, and by the time Fancher finally released it in March 1980 on her brand new Frontier Records label, the band had decided to call it quits. Still, the EP was released to decent fanfare and gradually became a record collector favorite.
Fast forward to 2024 when Flyboys’ bass player and sometime singer/songwriter, Scott Lasken, discovered a reel of five unreleased Flyboys’ demos in his closet that even John Curry had forgotten about! Two of those songs, “Live for Today” and “Every Day,” did not appear on their Frontier debut, but three of the demos were re-recorded for the EP. The demo recordings are faster and looser thanks to the songs being brand new and recorded for the very first time. What a find!
In all, Flyboys’ The Complete Flyboys 1978–1980 consists of the original self-titled Frontier EP, the Square City 7″ and five previously unheard, unreleased demos. The album features all-new artwork and never-before-seen Flyboys photos designed by the band’s singer/songwriter John Curry. The new package gives a fuller, more well-rounded view of the Flyboys and likely will bring about a new respect and the enthusiasm they’ve deserved all along.
