Flattop Rider Makes Country Music That’s Distinctly Colorado

Duncan Coker is ready for a rebrand. The musician has been crafting country-flavored roots music under his own name for years, but as he and his band became closer, they settled on a new moniker.

“We’re going on our second year, and we just feel like a band,” he explains. “We want to have a band name, and that’s what we are now: Flattop Rider.“

The band’s last album under the name Duncan Coker, Roadside Attractions, was released in the fall and has received some radio airplay on KGNU in Boulder and KRFC in Fort Collins. “We’re still promoting it,” Coker says. “You know, we’re an independent band [and] the record was produced all here in Colorado, so we’re just doing it ourselves to get the word out.”

That boots-on-the-ground promo includes a performance at the Skylark Lounge on Wednesday, April 1, one of the group’s first shows as Flattop Rider. Singer-songwriter Chelsey Webb is also on the bill, and the concert is free to attend.

While the band has a new name, its sound is still authentic to what the members have been cooking up over the past few years. Roadside Attractions is one of those perfect campfire-side or mountain-drive records — rootsy with just the right amount of twang, and lyrics that elicit Colorado landscapes. It was recorded in Boulder at Broadway Music Studios and mixed at Coupe Studios, with Coker’s friend and fellow musician Bob Barrick producing and engineering the album and Dave Glasser handling the mastering.

Coker moved to Boulder with his family about thirteen years ago, and he’s found as much inspiration in the local scene as he has in the surrounding mountains. Flattop Rider came together organically through the tight-knit bluegrass and country communities; the band now comprises Coker on lead vocals and guitar; Jason Paradise on backup vocals and electric guitar; Neva Wilder on backup vocals and fiddle; Jerry Ware on bass; and Jim Dorschel on drums.

“Moving out to Boulder, I just really embraced the music scene,” Coker says. “It’s just a great community. I got into the bluegrass scene and then joined a song circle…I also went to Song School in Lyons. All of that experience just gelled.”

He wrote most of the songs for Roadside Attractions, but “the final product is very collaborative,” he says. “We took a lot of stuff that we had already been playing live for probably six months, so when we came to the studio, a lot of the songs were really well-rehearsed.”

Coker considers the songwriting process a craft that you need to hone. He writes daily to get the gears turning, and eventually, inspiration strikes. “It’s just practice,” he says. “I’ve probably written hundreds of songs, and maybe one out of twenty might be good. It’s really a numbers game. … But it’s very much a craft. I found, when I first started writing maybe ten years ago, it was kind of a labor — I’d agonize over this line or that line — but I’m much faster now.”

The hard work has paid off. Roadside Attractions kicks off with the catchy earworm “Rodeo Girl,” which Coker says was inspired by his wife. And then there’s “Polly,” which is based on his mother. “I paint her in a very heroic way, from my point of view, when she was much younger, before I was even around,” he says. “But I thought it would be cool to write her story.”

Listening to the record, it’s impossible not to tap your foot and groove along, which means hearing the songs in a live setting should inspire a whole lot of dancing.

“We like to bring the energy,” Coker says. “We’re Western roots and country, but it’s kind of its own thing. We like folks to be dancing, and most of our songs are definitely up-tempo and fun. We have some story-driven songs, but then we’ll beak out into a jam and Neva will do a solo.

“I used to be into the country dancing, like the two-step dances,” he adds. “I always think about that when we’re doing arrangements: Can you dance to this?”

The crowd at the Skylark is certain to find out.

Flattop Rider plays Skylark Lounge, 140 South Broadway, at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, April 1; the show is free.