Feature: Luxury Teeth Decodes ‘DCxPC Live & Dead Vol. 3 Luxury Teeth’
What was the creative process for the album like?
Well, I (Dave -Vocals) had been out of performing music since 2018 when my previous band COPSTABBER broke up....and I'd been LOVING the time when I could really enjoy music as a consumer but.....it's just not sustainable for me and when these guys asked me if I wanted to get together and see what was up....it finally felt like the RIGHT amount of time before I got back into it. I remember being so worried that I was going to walk into the room and have the worst time. I thought I only knew Shaun (drums) since he was the guy who called me. Turns out I already at least knew 3 or 4 other guys (Do any of us really know ourselves?) just from everyone being in awesome bands like National Razor FDIC, The Revelevens, Die Cheerleader Die so it already felt better. We started jamming and I knew IMMEDIATELY that TALENT or CHOPS or SWAG (or whatever you call it) was absolutely not going to be the problem and there was PLENTY of chemistry to go around. I have to say that the songwriting chemistry between us was and continues to be amazing. We had one initial lineup change from the OG lineup when we brought in Drew (Stillborn, Professional Victim) to the OFFICIAL lineup and the lineup that appears on both of the recordings here.
I write as often and manically as possible and tend to have MULTIPLE "skeletons" or at least vaguely formed concepts and some cool lines I want to say already going at any given time so a lot of the process has been, one of the musical fellas coming in and saying "Yo check this shit out!" and jamming on it while I scramble through the lyric book. So many of our songs came together that way on this record. It's great when it comes naturally.
Were there any moments in the recording process when you knew you had something special?
Which side? I mean Side A (LIVE) is nothing BUT something special. It was a memorial for a great friend of all of ours who worked at the Ottobar in Baltimore MD. GBH played a show there a few years and another patron murdered him outside. This was GBH's first time back at the Ottobar after that and the show was a fundraiser for the family and a way for a couple hundred of us to gather and remember Tom who was one of the all time best. So....yeah we knew this was something special.....but then.... mere days before the show, Tom's murderer (who was already back on the street by the way....bullshit Justice system) contracted some sort of blood and heart infection and died what I was told was a really unpleasant death and it couldn't have happened to a better guy. As you hear me say on the LP, "Rest in Piss". We also were opening for GBH which is literally something special for me ANYTIME I get to that.
The Studio (DEAD) side was just our first time as a band going through the process. By the time we hit the studio, we were definitely already playing out a lot and had a ton of songs but there is something really fuckin cool about getting the first record done, and being able to say "Fuck yeah, boys....it's a banger!!!"
How do you translate the essence and energy of ‘DCxPC Live & Dead Vol 3 Luxury Teeth’ in a live setting?
Well, that's the beauty of this record....you get to see for yourself....at least to some extent. There are definitely songs you get to hear on both sides and what you prefer! What do you like? Do you like the studio setting where every tone and note is dialed in? Or the live version where (like on the fucking first song of the record "Generational Germs") where I go to start screaming my lyrics and my microphone disconnects and I miss the first 4-5 words trying to plug the cable back in! That's the magic of the live shit. A lil improvisation here, a sour note there, everything is played at 110% speed (I call that "Showcaine") and that energy can be beautiful....if you can back it up and hit it! I feel like on this particular night....we were FIRED UP.
Can you tell us more about you as a band?
Honestly....on personal levels we are all pretty hardcore adults with real jobs. We have all been playing music our whole lives pretty much and our goals now are to make rad music. Be regionally popular. Get outta town for weekenders a couple times a year and put out records that WE would want to hear. So far it's working well. Now what the hell is "Luxury Teeth"? The name was born from the idea that most of us have growing up that you have all these things that you think you couldn't live without. Your parents tell you to brush your teeth and shit or else you won't be able to eat and you'll die...BUT IT'S A FUCKING SCARE TACTIC KID! YOU ONLY NEED LIKE 10 OF THESE THINGS, THE REST OF EM YOU CAN TAKE EM OR LEAVE EM!.... But that led me to the bigger idea that people like your parents, your best friend growing up, your first love....all the things you thought you couldn't live without are taken from you over time and, at least in my case, I've lived without them. I'm not saying life is better or easier now that they are gone but you LIVED THROUGH IT. You wouldn't believe how strong you are until you have to be. The band is really cool for me as the principal lyricist because I have never had the freedom to really try to push myself and write about more abstract ideas and concepts than I have with this band. We've written songs about destroying the Hollywood beauty standard (Our first single from the album "Vanity is a Fuck"), A song about how generational trauma can be stopped...but it has to start with you, a song about what I presume the next stage of evolution will be, which I hope will eliminate the need for linguistic communication, we've written about how the homeless and addict communities are already so disadvantaged in so many ways but society goes out of its way to make it increasingly hard for them, and we write songs about how sometimes a motherfucker does need to get jumped, so keep a couple buddies around just in case you find one.
How do you engage with your audience during a live performance to create a memorable experience for them?
Well, as I said before, I'm the vocalist for Luxury Teeth and so that's pretty much my whole job right? So after this many years of being in bands pretty consistently, it feels pretty natural to be on stage or in front and taking advantage of my platform to talk shit, give a little info about a song, all the standard stuff...but Scott from DCxPC happens to think that I have superior stage banter and if you ask most people NOT in the band what I do to engage the crowd, they'd probably tell you about how many stupid faces I made or say something about "Crazy eyes" but more than anything when it's time for me to shut the fuck up and play the next song I'm going to scream my fucking dick off. Nobody has seen me give less than 100% yet....except some of those times when maybe I should’ve gotten cut off earlier.
