Glasgow synth outfit Damn Teeth have released their sophomore album ‘Real Men’ and it is available now via Buzzhowl Records. To celebrate the occasion Paul McArthur, vocalist of the band, takes us through six of his favourite albums.
- Charli XCX – Vroom Vroom
- The Juan Maclean – The Future Will Come
- Marilyn Manson – Mechanical Animals
- Blacknecks – Four Cunts & A Badge
- Xiu Xiu – Angel Guts: Red Classroom
- Kate Bush – The Dreaming
Charli XCX – Vroom Vroom EP
SOPHIE’s production is a vital touchstone for latter-day DT, particularly the early NUMBERS singles (compiled as Product) and Charli XCX’s Vroom Vroom EP. Vroom Vroom’s title track is both a heterodox banger and a time-tested tour jam, guaranteed to elicit Pavlovian frothing from any and all Teeth on any and all occasions. The dynamics are off-kilter, the sounds clash and strain, and nothing fits quite as it should; AND YET, the song sinks its hooks into you and refuses to let go. SOPHIE’s sound is warped, melted and totally danceable – we live in hope that our music can one day be just as artificial.
The Juan MacLean – The Future Will Come
John MacLean’s old band, Six Finger Satellite, released two deeply underrated albums in the mid-90s that were seminal texts for the infant Teeth (Severe Exposure and Paranormalized). Since then, MacLean has put down the guitar and picked up a sequencer, mirroring our own journey away from Rock Music (still very much a work in progress). Any admission of influence is ultimately an admission of thievery – the particular thing we’ve stolen from TJM is the disco foundation, building and layering whilst trying our best to avoid Rockist booby traps like “the kick-in” or “loud/quiet dynamics” or “electric guitars”. (Honorable additions to the disco hi-hat hitlist include LCD Soundsystem and Jessy Lanza, from whom we’ve also borrowed liberally.)
Marilyn Manson – Mechanical Animals
This album is pure glam plastic wrapped around yr inner ear. Levels of Manson fandom vary within the band, running the gamut from obsession to disdain – I personally think you’d be hard pushed to listen to “New Model no. 15” or “Posthuman” and not hear the influence on Real Men. This album has it all: it’s smart, sexy, and you can shake your ass to it. Not only that, but the production is incredible to boot – 21 years later, I still hear new details in this record (an electronic squiggle here, a syncopated drum machine accent there). To this not-entirely-impartial observer, Manson is enormously underrated musically, lyrically and vocally; when he’s firing on all cylinders, he’s a master sloganeer who can holler with the best of them. What more could you possibly want?
Blacknecks – Four Cunts & A Badge
Techno and its many mutations play heavily into the DT creative process, with hours upon hours spent devouring Future Sound of London, Perc Trax, classic Helena Hauff DJ sets and the EPs of Blacknecks (in pursuit of whom I braved the Machenesque horrors of the Megabus to attend the Quietus’ 10th anniversary rave last year). All of this electronic input transubstantiates into the 909 kicks buried under the chorus of “You’ll Only Make It Worse”, the enormous distorted hits that punctuate “Coasting On Genetics”, and the walls of Hoover synths scattered throughout “Heavily Telegraphed/Correctly Aligned”. Keep an eye out for Damn Teeth’s exclusively Techno/Trap-influenced third album, available in all good record stores circa Summer ‘25, if we’re all still here.
Xiu Xiu – Angel Guts: Red Classroom
This time it’s personal. Jamie Stewart is (with a gun to my head) my all-time favourite singer. I’ve been marinating in his voice and his peculiar musical approach ever since I first heard Xiu Xiu as a Very Troubled Teenager back in the bleak mid-00’s. Alongside many other like-minded scribes, such as Whitehouse’s William Bennett and Oxbow’s Eugene Robinson, Stewart has been a massive influence on my lyric writing – which is to say I defer responsibility to these people for any pleasure or pain you might experience whilst singing along to Real Men in the privacy of your bedroom (like I know you will). There are other Xiu Xiu records that cut deeper, but AG:RC is the one that most closely matches the Real Men mission – when it’s awake and wide-eyed, it truly takes Suicide to the dancefloor.
Kate Bush – The Dreaming
When on tour, each member of Damn Teeth has their own way of dealing with the long hours of travel – Niall and Seonaid tend to retreat into the Land of Podcasts, and Sean spends a lot of time reading or asleep, which often leaves myself and Stewart up front merrily rinsing 60s Folk all day long. HOWEVER, once Kate explodes through the stereo, The Teeth are collectively guaranteed to stand to attention. Any given song can spark a whispered singalong, a silently choked-back tear, or a feverish discussion as to how this or that sound was achieved (the Fairlight sampling in “Sat In Your Lap” being a particular DT fetish object). The Dreaming is Kate Bush’s best album – make it through “Get Out Of My House” unscathed then tell me I’m wrong.
‘Real Men’ is available to order here:
https://buzzhowlrecords.bandcamp.com/album/real-men
Damn Teeth are currently on tour in the UK:
15.07 Bristol – The Crofters Rights
16.07 London – The Old Blue Last
17.07 TBC
18.07 Brighton – The Green Door Store
19.07 Canterbury – UCA Bar Canterbury
21.07 Northampton – The Pomfret Arms
22.07 Lincoln – Akedo Gaming Bar
23.07 Norwich – Rabbit
24.07 Scarborough – Apollo Bar & Venue
25.07 Hull – The New Adelphi Club
26.07 Nottingham – JT Soar
27.07 TBC
10.08 Glasgow – The Hug and Pint
11.08 Edinburgh – The Safari Lounge
