Experimental punk rock band, DAIROKKAN, has been playing Florida’s Treasure Coast scene for over ten years. They released their first full length after a few lineup changes a few months ago. We caught up to guitarist, Dave McGahee, recently and discussed the new album entitled, “Without Wheels”, and here’s what he had to say.
Jim Cantore is the newest song on the album and was pretty much written in one day. Jacob pitched the basic chord movements and some lyrics, then we just took the ball and ran with it. By the end of the night, it was pretty much how it is on the album.
The Mother of all Whores started out as a riff I wrote when I was in high school. Jacob and I were trying to come up with another song, but had no real ideas, so I said, “fuck it” and pitched the verse riff, which was much slower. So, we revved it up and wrote the rest of the song around it. Then Jules came in and just killed it with the lyrics. It’s kind of weird how we work because we usually title the song before any words are written. So, when he made it about alcohol…man…. just fucking brilliant.
Impossible is the first song Dairokkan ever wrote. Our original drummer, Stick, started playing this beat and I just played the first thing that came to my mind. Jacob plays it different and faster now, and when Jordan joined the bass line changed some, but the guitar and vocals are pretty much how they were 10 years ago.
Splangy’s Unborn started as three fucking notes. Jacob came in with that intro bassline and, within an hour, he and I had the whole thing laid out. Then fucking Jules kills again with those excellent lyrics!
Quarters Mostly, I wrote on an acoustic. Totally different vibe. Almost had an “About A Girl” by Nirvana vibe if you can imagine that. Anyway, after transposing it to electric, we started fucking with the arrangement, adding curve balls and whatnot. Jules hit a home run again with the lyrics. I mean, what the actual fuck has really changed? Same old shit beneath the facade.
Sip Worthy is all Jordan and Jacob. We kind of re purposed it from a song their old band, 52 Cards Short of a Full Deck, used to play. Jordan and I swap on this track. He’s on guitar, I’m on bass. Jules wrote all new lyrics, even the cadence and melody are completely different from the 52 Cards version, and I wrote my own bass line.
Follow Your Balloon, I’m proud of. When I wrote this fucker, I knew it was taking a big bite. It took a lot of effort to get this baby tight. There’s a lot of weird changes going on that are so different from anything we had done before. Once we had the instrumentation down, I was like good luck with that Jules lol. Then he comes back the very next rehearsal with the whole damn song finished! That man is brilliant I tell you.
Orange Drink was our white whale. This damn song took fucking forever to write. We just kept fucking with it, adding shit, rearranging it. Man, I don’t remember exactly how long it took to iron it out, but it felt like years. Again, we’re like good luck Jules and this fucker nails it! Is there anything he can’t do?
Jamass just flowed out. We got together one rehearsal and said we’re writing a new song today, then we fucking did. We tweaked some minor things here and there, but 95% of it was written that day. It was pretty cool. Boosted our confidence.
My Shoes Hurt , Jacob wrote in jail. When he got out, he pitched the basic chord movements and lyrics, then we Dairokkan’d the shit out of it.
Things and Stuff is our most deep and philosophical song. Such profound existentialism. (Whatever that is)
Nameless is another song Jacob wrote in jail! LOL.
