Royal Teeth
Sunday, February 16
When Seattle Weekly spoke with Royal Teeth frontman Gary Larsen in June, the Louisiana-based indie dance-pop quintet he leads with singer Nora Patterson was preparing to release its debut album, Glow
(it dropped in August). Everyone in the group had already quit their day jobs and devoted themselves full time to the band—this brought about the EP Act Naturally
; an anthemic single, “Wild”; and an appearance on Carson Daly—but the group was still eager to do more. “We hope by the time this record comes out and we look back on another year,” Larsen said at the time, “we’ll feel like we’ve moved forward even farther.”
Fast forward to today, and seven months of touring—not to mention appearances in ads for Buick and State Farm—has been a boost for the band. “It feels really great to have built up to the point where we have an entire album of music for people to listen to and people are coming out to see the shows,” Larsen says. “It’s that slow climb, but we’re at the point now where we’re really starting to see results.”
The band recorded Glow with award-winning Canadian producer Gavin Brown, who’s worked with, and helped garner awards for, the likes of Metric, Lady Gaga, Sarah Harmer, and others. In June, Larsen discussed the process of working at Brown’s studio in Toronto, far from the humid climes of the band’s native South. “A lot of people say when they listen to our music, there’s a very bright and positive vibe, it’s very colorful music. But we recorded [the new album] in Canada during one of the coldest winters they’ve had in years.” The climate helped inspire the tone of the record, Larsen says, imbuing it with more intimacy than Act Naturally while retaining “the bright, positive nature of our music.”
Larsen is an accurate spokesman—the album is a collection of songs that inspire thoughts of love and adventure, heavy on percussion and sing-along-ready choruses; Larsen and Patterson’s pretty vocals harmonize well while each shining on their own. Yet true to Royal Teeth’s ambition, Larsen is already looking ahead, anxious to expand his band’s sound on the next album, on which he hopes to capture the energy of its live show.
Back on tour for now, Larsen remains open to whatever the future brings. “We really don’t have a feeling of how far we can go,” he says. “But if it’ll keep going, we’ll keep pushing it.” With Chappo, Hibou. Neumos, 925 E. Pike St., 709-9442, neumos.com. 8 p.m. $18 adv. 21 and over.
