Flashes does indeed have more flashes of potential than many of the countless other one-shot
psychedelic albums of the late '60s, but this Boston group's sole effort is quite erratic, and not graced with much good material. The best points in their favor are the bracing vocals of
Connie DeVanney, whether she's singing alone or blending with male voices in a manner reminiscent of (and probably highly influenced by) early
Jefferson Airplane. But despite the presence of
Tom Wilson at the production reins, the production often sounds underdeveloped, and the songs frequently meander in a derivative twilight between
folk-rock and
psychedelia. There are some fair driving
folk-rockers in the 1967
Airplane style here, like
"People of the Night" (with a lengthy Eastern-style
psychedelic guitar break),
"Hung-Up Chick," and
"High Flying Bird," the last of them a
folk song covered by numerous rockers in the last half of the 1960s, not least
Jefferson Airplane themselves.
"Dark World" is haunting
folk-rock-
psychedelia, and the best solo showcase for
DeVanney's voice, while
"Sleep" has some almost gothic male-female vocal interaction. But the album also has some overlong
blues-rock noodling and
psychedelic droning, mediocre good-time
jug band-influenced stuff, and self-consciously heavy social commentary. ~ Richie Unterberger