Like they say, timing is everything. It was only two years ago that Joey Chaperon was knocking around Montreal playing “super-heavy stuff, almost grindcore” and going nowhere fast in a band he’s too embarrassed to name. Cut to December 2008 and the vocalist is a few days away from a trip to Vancouver’s Transmission conference as a featured artist with an outfit—Final Flash—that has barely celebrated its first anniversary. Talking to the Straight from his Montreal home, Chaperon can only speculate about the reasons for such a swift change in fortunes. “Maybe it’s the right kind of music that people want to listen to right now,” he offers. “I guess we’re just making music that’s sincere, and people can tell.”

To put things in perspective, Final Flash had a whopping two shows and zero records under its belt when it started to cut a swath through CMW, Pop Montreal, and the Canadian Music Café. At the last event, which is part of the Toronto International Film Festival, Chaperon and his four cohorts found themselves approached by—of all things—Disney. “I was like, ‘What?!’ ” Chaperon says with a chuckle in his heavy Québécois accent. “I pictured myself playing in The Lion King 3.” The band ended up walking away with a publishing contract from L.A.’s North Star Media, which, weirdly enough, counts Cher, Rod Stewart, and Bobby Womack among its clients. “I don’t know what we’re going to do with that yet,” Chaperon remarks casually.

So what’s the big whoop? The answer is on the band’s MySpace page, with its four basement-tape forays into new, weird Canadiana. “The Rain of Stones” recalls Black Mountain’s “Stormy High” off the top, before snapping seamlessly into the much lighter, blue-sky territory of classic West Coast folk-rock, and eventually doubling up into a beautifully tense chorus of martial snare hits and clanging piano notes. The histrionic “Shine” pits a circular Hammond organ figure against Alexandre Girard’s combustible guitar and slashing violin parts. “Waiting for the Sun” is five minutes of down-stroked, lo-fi indie psychedelia with a wailing-cat chorus, part Wolf Parade and part Spacemen 3. And best of all, the quick-stepping “Welcome to the House on Fire” seizes the listener with a jaunty piano hook and Robert Smith–style basket-case vocals, all collapsing into a half-time shout-along chorus while Chaperon rides over the top with a bad case of the flutters. It doesn’t take long for all this to get under the skin, and you’d probably want Final Flash at your festival, too. Meanwhile, Chaperon remains admirably unaffected by the attention. So unimpressed, in fact, that he’s willing to confuse matters with a name-change once the band’s Jace (Besnard Lakes) Lasek–produced debut arrives sometime next year.

“We just think we could find something that’s more rock,” Chaperon says. But he’s obviously unacquainted with the on-line Urban Dictionary’s definition of Final Flash, which, believe it or not, reads, “The ultimate act of kicking ass.”

“What?” he exclaims. “That’s awesome! Ass-kicking? Wow. We’re ass-kickers. This name is getting some points now.”

Final Flash plays a Transmission Festival showcase at 151 West Cordova Street tonight (December 4).