Dance Gavin Dance are one of those bands that refuse to be pigeon-holed. Their sound is as eclectic and diverse as you could get within genres and as such is a delight to listen to. At times it feels as though two separate CD’s are overlapping at the same time, creating a whole new musical dynamic that owes as much to experimentation as it does to courage from the band.
“We have the backbone,” stressed Will Swan, guitarist, in reference to how they can genre hop so effortlessly and effectively. “Even when we are jumping around and changing genres you can still tell it is DGD because of the vocal style and the style of everyone n the band. We bring that to whatever we’re doing regardless of the genre and it ends up being that cohesive DGD sound whether we do it intentionally or not.”
One of the more unique aspects of the bands sound is the contrasting vocal styles of the two frontmen. While it is not uncommon to have dual vocals, the range between the two on show here has to be heard to be appreciated, with Swan admitting this was a key factor in putting the band together.
“Yeah, I like having those dual vocals,” he nodded, “and that idea when we started was kind of unique. After a while, other bands have done it and it has become a normal thing but it was a little bit weird at the time we came out having a straight up clean vocalist and a screamer. It was different and I liked that. It allowed for some chaos and also a lot of melodic moments so you could hear that duality.”
Listen to the attached audio to hear Will speak about the band’s upcoming album, Artificial Selection, on June 8, as well as the behind the scenes workings of putting that album together and the difficulties the band faced in picking singles to promote the album. Will also discusses the unconventional song titles and film clips, the climate that helped create Dance Gavin Dance and more.
Artificial Selection will be released on Friday, June 8 and can be pre-ordered at https://riserecords.lnk.to/ArtificialSelection. Singles Son of Robot and Midnight Crusade are out now on iTunes, Apple Music and Spotify.
