CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
I flip through Spin to find the interview with Tattoo Thief and it begins with a stunning photo spread—the four band members are posed in an auto shop as if the photographer caught them stealing cars and selling them for parts.
There’s a wall of muscle on display—Gavin’s shirtless and the tall, slender guy next to him has an open mechanic’s shirt with tattoos littering his forearms. Another guy is wearing grease-stained jeans and a T-shirt so tight I can see every ripple of muscle, and the last band member wears a white ribbed tank top that makes his dark olive shoulders look even broader.
Collectively, Tattoo Thief looks so raw, edgy and sexually charged that I believe they could make it as stars even if their music stank.
I dive into the story.
Stealing Their Way to the Top
How four guys from Pittsburgh
took the music world by storm
By Cynthia Moyer
Tattoo Thief’s band members are more that just muscle and ink—they’re musicians bent on pushing rock to a new place with influences from hip-hop, indie hits, and jazz.
With a sold-out tour in progress, their sophomore release Beast has hit the top spot on the Billboard 200 list of bestselling albums less than a year after Feast reached No. 1.
Tattoo Thief has joined an elite group of only ten artists—most recently Eminem, Susan Boyle, and One Direction—who have sent two albums to the top within a year.
But with this meteoric rise comes speculation that the stars could burn out just as fast. We caught up with Tattoo Thief’s front man Gavin Slater for Twenty Questions to find out how they’re juggling fame, pressure and a passion for music.
1. Gavin, many people who discovered your music recently don’t know that Tattoo Thief has been together for seven years. How does that affect your music?
We’re a garage band at heart—we’re always jamming and trying new stuff. We started in Tyler’s mom’s garage and we still play scrappy like that. You know, something goes wrong at a show and you don’t let it get to you. You play through it.
I think working together for so long makes crises seem smaller, and so it’s easier to stay together knowing that these guys got my back no matter what.
There will always be haters who say we’re going to burn out, but who cares? That wasn’t the point. The point was to play music, have fun and maybe meet some girls.
2. Girls?
It worked. Next question?
3. In your mind, what made Feast and Beast so successful?
If you measure success by albums sold, then the answer is obvious: the fans. We have some amazing people backing us, telling their friends, tweeting clips from our concerts. And I think that energy is contagious. When someone’s passionate about something, it just works better than a slick marketing campaign.
But you don’t get passionate fans without good music. So we spend a lot of time challenging each other, trying to pull out the best stuff and then push it further.
4. Tell us about collaboration in the band. Who does what?
I’ve been writing songs ever since I got a guitar in high school. Jayce is amazing with the instrumentals, so I just lay down a melody and lyrics and he’s the one who figures out the shape of the song and how we’ll play it.
Dave likes to pretend he’s a half-wit drummer, but up until two years ago he was our business manager, booking gigs and figuring out the contracts.
Tyler’s the one who brought all of us together. He wanted to be in a band, so he found us. Ever since then, he’s the guy who puts things together. He found our agent and our producer for Beast. He’s like a human Rolodex.
5. What do his tattoos have to do with Tattoo Thief?
He did a tat on his arm that looked a lot like another guy’s and the guy started calling him Tattoo Thief.
6. Which tattoo? Is there a story behind it?
Not telling, and yes. And that’s all you’re going to get from me on those two questions. Ask Tyler.
8. An early article about you said you used to be a street busker. What was your life like before Tattoo Thief?
I was living out of my truck and doing odd jobs at an RV park where I could get a shower for a quarter and do laundry for a dollar. I washed dishes at a restaurant and I busked to get by.
I met Tyler on a street corner when he flipped a twenty into my guitar case. That got my attention. Tyler told me to follow him back to his mom’s house where I met the other guys. He told them I was what they needed. I don’t think they believed it at the time, but when Tyler wants something, you just trust him. He’s rarely wrong.
9. Did the band click right away?
Pretty much. Dave got us gigs and we started playing on the weekends for tips and free beer. It was the most fun I’d ever had, and I finally felt like I was a part of a family. Tyler’s mom let me stay with them and the guys in the band became my brothers.
10. Your band started in Pittsburgh, where some of you went to college. How did you get to New York?
After the guys graduated, we knew that the only way to really make it big was to go to a big city, so we flipped a coin—L.A. or New York. You know which city won. The four of us got a tiny, crappy apartment in Brooklyn and Dave hustled the gigs. Tyler worked his magic and met a bunch of other musicians and that got us on the right track.
11. You all sound very different. What’s kept you together so long?
It’s the music, but also the process of how we write. We stuff ourselves in a room and just say, “two songs,” and work until we have them good enough to play. Sometimes, that only takes a few hours. Sometimes it takes days.
12. Is it just the four of you?
And Lulu. She’s a friend of the band and she helps us out, gives us a different kind of push. She’s my muse.
13. You’ve been seen with Lulu Stirling at a number of events. Is she your girlfriend?
Come on. You’ve got twenty questions and you ask that?
14. OK, then, Gavin, you’ve been linked to a lot of beautiful women including the model Maya Shaw and the socialite Monica Wells. Who’s got your heart?
My heart’s in my music, and whoever helps that along is part of it. Whoever undermines it can’t be part of my life. It’s as simple as that.
I’m not in the market for a steady girlfriend, if that’s what you’re asking. I like keeping my options open.
You’re breaking millions of hearts right now.
Is that a question?
15. No. What’s the secret to your success?
There is no secret. You start thinking you’ve got one, that you know some magic formula to take a ride up the charts, and you’ve lost touch with reality.
For our band, it’s luck and hard work and sweat and failure. It’s a lot of failure. You fail enough, you do enough wrong things and maybe you’ll stumble on the one right thing that really works.
16. What are you going to do with all the money you’ve made?
Pay our agent. Seriously, it’s been a crazy ride to the top and we’ve hardly had time to catch a breath. I just bought a place in New York. Jayce is building a music studio and Dave is investing in a new label as a partner. Tyler will probably get some more tattoos.
17. What are your plans for after the Beast tour wraps up?
More albums. More music. We haven’t figured out what the next album will sound like yet. I want to give our fans something they love but also something that challenges them.
18. Any plans for a solo career?
Why? It’s more fun with the band. We’ve been together so long, I can’t imagine starting over with anyone else.
19. What’s next for Tattoo Thief?
We’ve got a twenty-city tour going and we’re about halfway through. When we’re done with it, we’ll take a short break and then we’ll get back into the studio for another album. New music keeps us going.
20. What inspired “Peace of Madness?” This song has really resonated with fans.
Nothing personal. And if I’ve counted right, that’s twenty questions. Catch you later.