"Although I didn't write this song, it spoke to me in a way that made me feel as if it was my own story,” Brandon said. “I found myself playing it over and over again in my bedroom, remembering situations that I've been through.”
Check out the video for yourself below.
The video for "Be Your Own Dentist" is a strange one, not out of line with the left-of-center approach to drag that Katya has become known for since her successful stints on two seasons of RuPaul's Drag Race. Released to coincide with National Dentist's Day, the video is an immersive 3D experience, partly inspired by Holy Mountain, partly by the masochistic undertones that come with teeth.
"That's the ultimate area if you wanna get hurt," she explains over Zoom. "You know what I mean? I can't think of a more torturous place to sit in than the dentist chair." Katya's guided meditation provides some solace in a time of widespread discomfort and chaos. When faced with the impending doom that comes with a dentist appointment, "Be Your Own Dentist" offers up a comforting alternative: why not fix the problem yourself?
Check out the video, and our exclusive interview with Katya, below.
Tell me a little bit about the conception of this music video. How did you come up with it?
Well, it's really the brilliance of this friend Jonathan Sims. He directed it, it's kind of his brain child. When I saw that he does these immersive 3D constructions, I thought it was so cool, it's so cool. I’ve wanted to do a virtual reality meet and greet for a while, so it was always this thing on the back burner. I was like okay, we need to just do something and for some reason it just felt right to do it for the meditation track. You know, it's like dropping into its space, the imagery is really gory but I think it’s the perfect immersive experience to go deeper in 3D.
Have you ever used 3D before? Like, with the oculus?
I have, I’ve done virtual reality where you walk on the plank and you’re on top of a building and then you fall. It was kind of unpleasant.
Yes! It’s totally unpleasant! I remember the first time I put on the headset and I almost started crying. It’s like, so intense, it was so funny.
I mean, have you seen those videos of grandmas doing VR and, like, crashing into the wall and screaming?
I’m that grandma!
I feel like you’re known for your pearly whites. Do people compliment your teeth a lot?
Yeah, they do! It’s funny, I’m actually overdue to go to the dentist and you know, it’s just such a strange profession. Like, the weird mythology around it, and it’s like really difficult to become a dentist and it’s just such a strange job. Like, who would wanna be a dentist?
That’s true…
But you know, my orthodontist did a great job. I had braces, so I’m really grateful to him… Dr. Bennet!
My association with dental work is that it's so tedious. I had braces for two years and I had those gross rubber bands that move your teeth forward. Some people are blessed with perfect teeth and never have to do anything like that… whereas other people are just doomed.
Yeah, and I think that in this country, especially in Los Angeles, people are obsessed with teeth. Like, Americans are obsessed with teeth. I was watching a French movie the other day and holy shit, these people's grills are jacked! The guys would have brown teeth and you would never see that here, not anymore at least. I think it’s equally weird, like this obsession with these giant ceramic tiles in the mouth.
And why aren't teeth included in our health insurance? Like, we have to get a separate dental insurance.
I... don’t… fucking… know! With teeth especially there are a lot of social signifiers around that. Like, there’s a lot of shame and poverty, you know, the shame of not being able to afford to fix your teeth. I know plenty of people who couldn’t replace a molar because it was $2000. So I don't know why, it’s just crazy.
My mom always tells me to take care of my teeth especially, because I guess she sees from her mom how tedious it is, especially when you’re older, like, dentures. It’s kind of dark actually.
It’s super dark. You watch the whole organism deteriorate. It’s like the control center in a lot of ways, the mouth. It’s the really important, unavoidable part of your body and you can’t really hide from it. Tooth pain is the worst, like, I have friends who have such bad teeth and are always in some kind of pain, it’s horrible.
I mean, I have permanent retainers on the top and the bottom.
Me too! I have it on the bottom rack.
Did you like having braces?
I loved having braces.
Why?
Because it was something new and so I was like, this will be fun. It was also at the time when everyone was getting them so it wasn’t weird. I kind of loved when they would tighten the braces at the orthodontist, and it would like ache, it just felt so weird and cool.
I kind of understand that. The pain was weirdly satisfying. Do you think there’s a masochistic element to teeth?
Yeah. In this film called Little Shop of Horrors there’s a sadistic dentist who is played by Steve Martin, and it’s hysterical because that’s the ultimate area if you wanna get hurt. You know what I mean? Like, if you wanna enjoy some torture, like, I can’t think of a more torturous place to sit in than the dentist chair. The last two times I've been to the dentist, the hygienist was so rough and brutal that I left an entire sweat print of my body on the chair, it was so horrible.
I've been bleeding lately whenever I floss and it’s so gross.
Are your gums jacked up?
I don't think so. What should I do?
Gums are really important. You probably just have to get dentures, like, tomorrow, immediately!
Were there any specific references that you pulled from for this video?
There’s this movie called Holy Mountain that has this temple set-up and we mirrored that with the opening image of me as an instructor and then the two disciples on each side. I also referenced the film Hellraiser. The film has these crazy demons called cenobites and that's what I modeled the look of the two demons on the side of the constructor after.
How are you approaching your music career?
Like Jennifer Lopez, I think. I think that’s the model, and the body. No, I mean, it’s all fun, it’s basically just making collaborative art work and there’s no standard or expectation and there’s no goal other than to do it well and have fun. It’s a lovely position to be in to be like, 'Oh yeah, I could make something fun and good to listen to that I think other people would wanna listen to.' Then, making imagery around it, it’s so great because I mean, it’s tough, there’s so many people wanting to go into music and wanting to be successful at making music. Every single person wants to be a musician.
Every single drag queen, too.
Yeah, which is always a bit strange to me, although some of them don’t. Some of them sort of get talked into it. But, I’m really proud of it, I actually really love it, it was important to me that I liked the songs a lot, that I’m not embarrassed by them because some of the music can be shitty. And honestly, not that you asked, but I will say that Tatianna and her song "Same Parts” is the best track ever produced by a drag queen. It’s a banger, your panties will drop. I have a fantasy about financing my own music video to her song.
Which drag queen who doesn’t make music would you wanna see a track from?
I'm not sure, but I think Bianca [Del Rio] should do home security alert systems, so if someone breaks into your mansion, it’s her just screaming racial epithets.
O Future designs, curates, and creates all facets of their music, appearance, and visual material, considering themselves a kind of art collective. They’ve recently scored an Ai Weiwei film, and make everything from “pop music to symphonies to visual arts to sculptures to film scores and more…”
Enter into O Future’s imagining of a sci-fi movie set to their song “Dinner,” below.
faang's new music video for "Rockstar" follows them and a group of friends speeding through the vacant streets of L.A. and encapsulates the energy of those that reside there. It’s pure chaos that erupts from beneath the surface of this cinematic masterpiece, with camera shots are pure flames. The heavy bass coupled with a badass guitar riff that lingers throughout the video is quite literally enough to send you to the f*cking moon.
Read our exclusive interview with the duo below.
What’s the perfect place or mood to listen to your music?
Going really fast in a car. Or when you're in a plane, the moment it's lifting off the runway.
What do you want people to feel when they listen to your music?
Hope and maybe a little bit of euphoria (but not too much) and a whole lotta swag.
In what dimension do you think that your upbringing and environment shaped the sound of your music?
Ky—I think listening to Kanye at his peak while experiencing the first gen of an internet driven over-exposure to an unattainable standard of success has kind of defined our production style. The hyper relevant pop-yet-cinematic aesthetic of MBDTF and Yeezus inspire me to this day and has influenced so much of what we make.
Luke—Adding to what Ky said, having grown up all over the country and never feeling attached to a physical place, I really feel like I was raised on the internet, and have always had a self aware but burning desire to be deep down the rabbit hole of American spectacle, so that level of mediation and energy totally shapes the music for me.
Do you like to accentuate the meaning of the song with your visuals or do you prefer to give the song a whole new meaning with a music video?
Ky—At this point I’m not trying to establish a real narrative that binds the songs and visuals together. The visuals are more like scenes from a movie that takes place in a “faang world” so to speak, the soundtrack of which is our music. I do want to start moving towards more narrative driven work for faang in the future though.
Luke—Our aspirations are to get to the point where we have the resources and the tech we use is advanced enough where we can independently produce cinematic film-like experiences for faang.
For “Rockstar”, you’ve created an awesome music video. How does it compliment the story of the song?
Honestly the video was mostly an excuse to get a bunch of our friends together and have fun on camera. We also wanted to converge a bunch of cool people that we know, we've always felt like there's this crazy diversity of subgroups that make up the creative scene in NY and LA that are rarely all seen on camera together.
faang is a project of 2 artists. How do you divide the work? What’s the biggest advantage of being a duo in the studio?
Ky—I design and render out all of the 3D visuals we do, sometimes working with other photographers and DP’s for the live action portion of the work. I also produce/engineer all of the music. I think the biggest benefit of being a duo is whenever one of us is having a depressive episode the other one can help bring us out of it.
Luke—I do the majority of the vocals and creative direct a lot of the visuals alongside Ky. Another aspect of faang that I work on is the upcycling of “faang merch” by reworking vintage and designer clothes to have minimal net waste and brand them faang clothing to build out the world of faang, contrasting the studio level quality of Ky’s 3D work so we have both the physical and digital covered on the race to create fully saturated visuals.
The music video of “Rockstar” is very chaotic but in the best way possible. Why did you choose this mood for the video? And what’s the message of the visuals?
Ky—When we made the song, tensions were super high in the US and the world in general. "Rockstar" is a playful exploration of the grey area of these internal and external conflicts.
Luke—When I wrote, “Who knows what the right side is,” it was really me verbalizing the conflict that I felt making another song titled “Rockstar” in the hip-hop trap vein. That lyric is testament to the conflict we feel making hip hop adjacent music, while continuing to do so because at the end of the day we genuinely love making it and seeing how the stuff we’ve made has inspired and brought people together.
"Satellites” is a real bop where you showcase your massive songwriting talent. Tell us more about the message of the song. And is the song based on your experiences in your career?
Ky—Luke and I are both kind of obsessed with technological advancement whether it's good or bad, and the implications it has on our future. The song felt a little like it belonged in a more optimistic yet still dystopian version of Blade Runner. That's what inspired its loose narrative of a departure from earth at the tail end of an apocalypse while also feeling like there is something beautiful to starting from scratch.
Luke—"Satellites" is an aspirational ballad that acknowledges how much damage has been done and continues to be done, dancing on the razor's edge of the touch and go race between Utopia and Oblivion, a poem in the dark.
Your lyrics are honest and very relatable. Have you ever felt a barrier between your emotions and songwriting? What’s the key to a good song for you?
Ky—We’ve both grown to respect the difficulty that can often arise when trying to connect an emotion to a lyric in a song in a way that really feels genuine. The hardest thing is getting this translation right, and performing it in a way that captures the spontaneous energy of felt when freestyling on a beat or instrumental for the first time. A good song to me is something that evokes emotion. It often has nothing to do with what is being said, but if an artist can align the instruments sonically or sing in a way that viscerally captures an emotion. I think that makes for a great song.
Luke—I agree.
Imagine COVID ends tomorrow, what’s the first thing you guys would do?
As douchey as this is, throw a party at Chateau Marmont. Or maybe the private club James Goldstien has in his house.
