There's a law in Alabama that prohibits masks in public, but that doesn't drag down the impact the disc jockey duo of Dead?Wait! has on Auburn's music scene.
Their villainous masks and comic book-like origin story on whatisdeadwait.com fit well with their persona on stage.
The pair tore up pages of textbooks at a show after finals week, and they almost ruined the stage lighting at Bourbon Street Bar from the ruckus that ensued.
Offstage, they're a couple of mysteriously reserved, timid guys still in masks struggling to get a few words out at first.
"A lot of people don't really know this, but they say they're really ugly underneath," said manager Alessio Summerfield, junior in radio, television and film.
"I get a lot of panicked phone calls in the middle of the night," he said. "They'll go through a lot of tracks and then just scrap them."
The duo seems to strive to protect not only its image (hence the masks), but also its musical image.
"You can't be afraid to start over," Dead?Wait! said. "We don't suck, but if our tracks suck, we make it not suck and start over."
Dead?Wait! call Auburn their home, and they began creating and sharing their music through SoundCloud in 2010.
Summerfield and public relations represenative Isaac Lim then played some tracks on their WEGL 91.1 radio show, and Dead?Wait! was picked up soon after to DJ live.
"We liked what we had going on," Dead?Wait! said. "We also didn't have any money."
Summerfield booked their first show in February 2011 at the former Independent venue. Since then, Dead?Wait! has played about 13 shows around Auburn, from house parties to their personal favorite show at last spring's Adult Swim Carnival.
"We've never had to ask for a show," Summerfield said. "Dead?Wait! told me not to go begging for shows, and I think that's pretty cool."
Dead?Wait! holds a booking philosophy of only playing one or two shows every couple of months, and according to Summerfield, it creates a sort of forced scarcity.
"It makes it an event, different from DJ's that you can expect to see play four nights a week," Summerfield said.
Dead?Wait! frequently uses DJ equipment like MIDI controllers, laptops and analog synthesizers on stage or "whatever our brains tell us at the time," Dead?Wait! said. "We like to switch it up every once in a while. We also just throw in some crazy sample and just repeat it a thousand times. People love that."
Dead?Wait! said they prefer recording their music in the woods, as their first EP "Do You Hate It Yet?" was recorded there because "music has lots of timbre from the woods."
The collaboration with John McMeans of H.Y.D.R.A. on "Do You Hate It Yet?" is the first of many to come according to the pair, as well as a collaboration with local artist SexChange on the up-and-coming unnamed EP.
"We like H.Y.D.R.A.," Dead?Wait! said. "He brings a lot of real music into the equation. He's really talented, and he mixes and brings his own instrumentation."
Currently, Auburn's New Media Club and Charlie Harper, junior in radio, television and film are directing a claymation video for "Driving Hybridz," a track off "Do You Hate It Yet?"
Plans are also in the works for a video of a track off the new EP directed by Brock Hanson, senior in radio, television and film, videographer John Henderson and Summerfield.
Prompted by the help raised to promote Dead?Wait! with videos, T-shirts and shows, Summerfield recently created Project Dead?Wait!.
"We're trying to get people from the community and students involved in the arts," Summerfield said. "I kind of used Dead?Wait! as a catalyst to get students interested in directing videos."
For upcoming shows and to download tracks, visit facebook.com/whatisdeadwait or whatisdeadwait.com
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