The Fearless Flyers Record Forthcoming EP At Blue Note NYC Residency

Supergroup The Fearless Flyers — Vulfpeck bassist Joe Dart and guitarist Cory Wong along with acclaimed drummer Nate Smith and guitarist Mark Lettieri — used their recent four-night, eight-show residency at The Blue Note in New York City to record a new EP. The quartet played the six new songs expected to be featured on the forthcoming set several times over the course of the run.

The Fearless Flyers IV, the tentative name for the ensemble’s fourth Vulf Records EP, is the follow-up to 2022’s The Fearless Flyers III. The two EPs came on the heels of The Fearless Flyers in 2018 and The Fearless Flyers II.

Vulf Records’ Jack Stratton was on hand at The Blue Note to capture audio and video of the six songs. On multiple occasions, Stratton addressed the crowd to explain the recording situation. “Really, exciting, historic tonight,” Dart and Wong’s Vulfpeck bandmate began on Sunday, the final night of the four-night stand. He detailed The Fearless Flyers’ origin story and then discussed what attendees were about to witness. “Tonight, we are going to attempt the fourth studio album live in the studio of Blue Note!”

Jack Stratton went on to reveal why they picked the club. “It’s a nice dead room. We have great D.I.s (digital inputs) coming off them, good drum mics — it sounds good,” Stratton said. “Tonight might be the night! They know the tunes better than ever so tonight might be the night,” the Vulf Records “A&R” finished before shooting footage of the six new songs.

Cory Wong followed Stratton’s address by explaining how the process for Fearless Flyers IV is different than the instrumental four-piece’s past EPs:

“If you’re unfamiliar with the process, also, typically we will write the songs and then just record them in that moment. For this, we wrote the songs four-ish days ago and we’ve had four-ish reps of them over the course of this weekend. So I do feel like we are more than ever with the material.”

According to stage setlists, the working titles for the new songs are “So Dan,” “Cashews,” “Walrus,” “Target Run,” “The Prophet Q” and “Gibby.” No indication of when The Fearless Flyers IV will arrive was given. On December 8, Stratton noted he would send the recordings to his “guy in Chicago” to “reamp everything” and emphasized “it’s not a live album.”

Listen to an audience recording of The Fearless Flyers at The Blue Note on Sunday, December 10 taped by Bootsy Jacobs that includes the full performance of The Fearless Flyers IV below:

Watch fan-shot video from the band’s late set on Friday, December 8 featuring “Side B” of The Fearless Flyers IV: