INTERVIEW: Big D and the Kids Table are back, with their positivity intact
Photo: Big D and the Kids Table, featuring Dave McWane, have a new album called Do Your Art. Photo courtesy of Mark Stern / Provided by Night Owl PR with permission.
Big D and the Kids Table, one of the most influential ska-punk bands from the last 25 years, have been touring and giving fans what they want for a long time. Sure, the COVID-19 pandemic stopped them in their tracks, but they weren’t alone. The entire music industry took a break, and now live performance is slowly getting back to normal.
And Big D is ready to debut again, and this time with original music. Amazingly, it has been almost a decade since the ska-punk band, fronted by vocalist Dave McWane, have released an album of original music. Do Your Art is out today, Oct. 22, and the band will celebrate the release with a virtual streaming party tonight at 9 p.m. EST and a special concert Saturday, Oct. 23 with Kill Lincoln and Catbite at the Brighton Music Hall in Allston, Massachusetts.
“I actually got the CD in the mail like two or three days ago, and that’s the moment where you go aah,” McWane said in a recent phone interview. “Big D has been a band since ‘95 or ‘96, and we put out a double album, Stomp Stroll, I believe around 2013. We were kind of nonchalantly going on our way, touring and put out a record backing up our back-up singers, the Doped Up Dollies, on their record, and then we did a covers record. We thought we were being active and touring and making music, but then someone said, ‘You know, Big D hasn’t made a record of originals in about eight or nine years.’ We went, ‘Are you serious? Has that much time gone by?’ So we frantically went, ‘Oh my God, we have to write a record.’ We just didn’t know that much time had passed.”
Do Your Art is being released during an interesting time. Politically, the country is in turmoil, and the pandemic is still out there, although there are positive signs that are making people feel progress is being made. McWane and his band decided to go positive with the new album because, to put it simply, that’s what they want to focus on right now.
“For many people, it’s harder to write a positive song than a negative song, maybe not harder, but non-instinctual for most people,” he said. “I’ve never really been gravitated to dreary songs. … We are ska, and we’re punk. Both ska and punk often lends itself to political things, but after the last four or five years, I didn’t want anything to do with what happened the last four or five years to touch the record, meaning any topical thing, because it was such a dark, dreary time. I didn’t want that — if you’ll allow me to be frank — ass stain on our record that we go tour around in the next two or three years. I just didn’t want it to touch it.”
Punk rock, in McWane’s estimation, often dissects and analyzes what’s wrong with the world, and the songs sometimes offer up different ways to change the current reality. But for the vocalist, sometimes such lyrical protests sound like a Facebook comment rant, and he wanted to steer clear of those tirades.
“Any sort of punk rock song that might question the establishment just sounds like a Facebook moan,” he said. “So I like punk rock, but I didn’t want to have a Facebook moan. The lyrical content of the punk rock kind of went more toward the old school of the Dead Milkmen and things like that, more fun or more Groovie Ghoulies and playing punk but not making people have to endure your opinions for three minutes. Still try to keep it light and positive, but still have the grit of punk in it.”
That’s why the new recording has songs like “New Day,” “Teenagers in Outer Space,” “Beautiful Way” and “Forever a Freak.” There’s even a tune called “How About a Pizza?”
Today, Big D and the Kids Table consists of McWane, Alex Stern (guitar, vocals), Ben Basile (bass), Alex Brander (drums, percussion), Casey Gruttadauria (keys, piano, melodica), Ryan O’Connor (saxophones), Jon Degen (saxophones), Paul E. Cuttler(trombone, flute) and Logan La Barbera (trombone), according to press notes. Like any band, there have been lineup changes over the years.
Big D and the Kids Table have been a steady presence on the indie music circuit, and they have earned the right to change things up. Their fan base is ravenous for their energetic live shows, and the albums of the past, like Good Luck, The Gipsy Hill and How It Goes, are still held up as beloved modern classics in the genre. Today, McWane has grown as a songwriter, but that doesn’t mean he’s lost the idea of his younger self.
“I wouldn’t section myself off from a younger writer because I still bitch and moan, even though I’m trying to say I’m not,” McWane said. “So I’m still touching upon subjects that I want to moan, or joke, or poke a jab at, but the decision to stay away from political Facebook stuff, who needs it? Who wants to do it? I feel like I’ve screamed my voice out on a lot of these subjects, and if people didn’t get it by [now], then there’s no real reason for me to say it again. I’ve said it in a lot of songs the way I want to say it. I’m not going to say it again.”
He added: “These days we’re all in it together. You can’t just unload on a track because so many people have people unloading on them day to day that it just gets lost in the noise. Your point gets lost in the noise.”
By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com
Big D and the Kids Table’s new album is called Do Your Art. They will celebrate the recording with a virtual event Friday, Oct. 22 at 9 p.m. EST and a live show Saturday, Oct. 23 at the Brigthon Music Hall in Allston, Massachusetts. Click here for more information and tickets.
