Dance Hall Crashers 'purr'

Bay-area ska band talks about life on an indie label and its new record

By MIKE DUTRA
Music Editor

Respect isn't something earned overnight. Relentless touring, consistently good songwriting and musical growth are all key to a band's earning respect from its peers, as well as a dedicated fan base. During the past 11 years, Bay-area ska-punks Dance Hall Crashers have become one of the most respected female-fronted bands in a male-dominated genre, although commercial success for the group has, thus far, proven to be illusory.
During a recent swing through southern California, Gavin Ham-mon, longtime drummer for DHC, talked to the Daily Trojan about the group's new record Purr, its departure from MCA Records and the future of the ska scene.
The story of Dance Hall Crashers began a decade ago in Berkeley, Calif., with the group being formed out of the ashes of Operation Ivy by Tim Armstrong and Matt Freeman, who would soon leave the group and form Rancid. DHC recorded only one album, breaking up before it was released. The group reformed in 1992 for a single show in San Francisco, and the response for the concert was so enthusiastic that the members of DHC decided to continue playing together.
Purr is much darker and harder musically than anything else that DHC has released, although it does continue DHC's tradition of satirical and sarcastic lyrics. Hammon explained that Purr's different sound "came from who we were, what we were writing, what we were listening to and what we were playing. We never really have any intention about how it's going to sound. We just write a bunch of songs and put them together and see how it sounds."
"It's pretty funny that people are calling Purr so dark and hard," he said, laughing. "Go back and listen to Lockjaw - there are some pretty dark and sarcastic songs on that album. The songs on Purr aren't necessarily all upbeat and happy. It's a different record, and we're not trying to make the same record over and over again. God only knows, we could be a country band next year."
After signing with MCA and releasing two albums and an EP on the label, DHC was not "happy and wanted to explore other options," Hammon said. "So when the big shakedown was happening with all of the labels merging with hundreds of bands getting dropped, we just decided to leave. We said we wanted to go and they said, ŒFine, go.' We were already working on a record, and we didn't want to do it like Honey, I'm Homely and have to wait between when we were finished and when it was released. We figured we could find a better home somewhere else," Hammon said of DHC's decision to move from MCA to Fat Wreck Chords, one of the premier indie punk imprints.
DHC signed with Fat Wreck Chords as a result of Purr being produced by NOFX frontman Fat Mike, who is also the owner of Fat Wreck Chords. Signing with Fat was a no-brainer for DHC, Hammon said. "We really wanted to do something with Mike and do something with Fat Wreck Chords. We wanted to explore our independent options since we didn't necessarily want to do another major label thing. We wanted something a little bit more suited to what we've been doing."
Life for DHC, the first band on the Fat Wreck Chords-distributed, female-only Pink & Black label, hasn't been much different being on an indie as opposed to a major label. "The only major difference is that the majors work radio and have a staff to do it. But Fat basically does the same stuff. The deal that we have works well for us and works well for what we're doing," said Hammon. "Fat has great distribution and everything seems to be pretty much similar, except that it's a whole lot cooler. It's just not a corporation and it does basically the same things. You can do all the same stuff on an indie as on a major."
When asked about the abortive ska fad of a few years ago, Hammon responded that it "was something the music industry was trying to create that never really happened. The (Mighty Mighty) Bosstones had a big single, and in terms of ska bands, that's pretty much all that really happened. It never really got beyond being in Pontiac and Burger King commercials. Fast food, the Gap and Coke were the only ones that really embraced the ska movement. In terms of radio, it never really happened."
Critics have called DHC's music too soft to be punk, but too hard to be a ska band, especially since the group has dropped its horn section. Hammon acknowledged the criticism but commented that DHC would "much rather be criticized for that rather than sound like every other ska band in California."
When asked about the eerie similarities between DHC's Purr and Save Ferris' most recent record, Modified, released two months after Purr, Hammon quietly acknowledged that Modified "sounds familiar. I can't really speculate on what they're doing. Sure, it can be kind of irritating if someone decides to run with it and they're hugely successful. There are moments when you kind of go, ŒYeah, great.' But you can't get caught up in that sort of thing. It is really easy for things like that to consume you.
"It's really easy for a band to sound like you, especially if they're a band that opened for you or you had tons of shows with or are your friends. They (Save Ferris) have been around for a few years and we've been around for quite a few longer. They're going to get flack for sounding like No Doubt just like we do. It is the kind of thing where if Save Ferris is successful, we'll get flack for sounding like Save Ferris," Hammon said. "We're both in similar genres with female vocalists, but you could say the same thing with bands with guys in them. They can be pretty much the same band, but people don't say anything. Because there are fewer bands with women fronting them, naturally there are a lot of comparisons."

Copyright 2000 by the Daily Trojan. All rights reserved.
This article was published in Vol. 139, No. 01 (Tuesday, January 11, 2000), beginning on page 9 and ending on page 11.