The Horse Flies

The Horse Flies

The Horse Flies are a United States alternative rock and folk group from Trumansburg, New York, active from 1981 to 2016. They begin in the late 1970s as Tompkins County Horseflies, formed by Jeff Claus and Judy Hyman, with Richie Stearns and John Hayward. The group comes out of the 1970s old-time music scene, but it develops a sound that brings post-punk and independent rock sensibilities into traditional material.

Style and approach

The band combines old-time string-band playing with a sharper, more angular approach. Their songs often mix Appalachian folk imagery with surreal or detached lyrical ideas, and their arrangements use acoustic instruments to create precise, mechanical patterns. They also extend cover songs and dance tunes into long, improvisatory live versions.

Albums and key recordings

The Horse Flies' first album, Human Fly (1987), includes a reworking of the Cramps song of the same name. Jeff Claus's I Live Where It's Grey is a hometown song about Ithaca, New York, and it recalls early Talking Heads and Devo while staying acoustic. Richie Stearns's version of Hush Little Baby turns the lullaby into a set of promises from someone with very little to give.

The second album, Gravity Dance (1991), shifts more strongly toward rock. It includes Claus's Sally Ann, which later appears in a version by Natalie Merchant, alongside a traditional French waltz that keeps the group tied to dance music and string-band roots. Stearns's I Need a Plastic Bag (to Keep My Brains In) and Claus's Life Is a Rubber Rope move closer to New Wave pop.

Live in the Dance Tent (1997) is the final recording of the original line-up and is recorded from the board at the 6th Finger Lakes Grassroots Festival of Music and Dance in July 1996. It shows the band’s live style through long jams and extended versions of songs such as Iko Iko and old-time tunes. A related 2000 release, Two Traditions, is assembled from sessions recorded immediately after that performance and is presented as a fusion of African and Appalachian traditions. It includes versions of tunes such as Ride Ol'Buck, Jimmy Sutton, Emory Bailey, and John Brown's Dream.

After a long gap, the band releases Until the Ocean in 2008, their first album in eight years. That record draws together much of their sound in one place, including Claus's Build A House and Burn it Down, Stearns's Veins of Coal, and versions of Doc Boggs's Drunkard's Child and the old-time tune Cluck Old Hen.

Line-up and related work

John Hayward, the band's bassist, dies in 1997, after which the group stops performing. It later resumes under different names, including Edna's Driveway, before performing again as The Horse Flies and touring in Europe and at festivals in the United States. The listed members are Jeff Claus, John Hayward, Judy Hyman, Richie Sterns, and Richie Stearns, and later performances include Judy Hyman on violin and vocals, Jeff Claus on guitar, banjo ukulele and vocals, Rich Stearns on banjo, tenor guitar and vocals, Taki Masuko on percussion, Rick Hansen on accordion and organ, and Jay Olsen on bass.

Hyman and Stearns tour with Natalie Merchant in 2000 and 2004 and contribute backing to Merchant's 2003 album The House Carpenter's Daughter, which also includes a cover of Claus's Sally Ann. Claus and Hyman also play locally in Ithaca in A Boy With A Fish, which releases one album. Stearns issues a solo album called Solo, featuring him on banjo, tenor guitar and vocals in his back yard, and later records Missing in 2011, largely with the Evil City String Band, with whom he regularly plays in the Ithaca area.

Film scores and discography

The Horse Flies' discography also includes Where the Rivers Flow North (1994), a film score, and A Stranger in the Kingdom (1998), another film score. Earlier releases include Chokers and Flies: Old Time Music (1985), a shared album with The Chicken Chokers.