Songfacts®:

• Nothing But Thieves' fourth album, Dead Club City, is a concept record about a city-size members' club. "We've left it vague whether it's a commercial wasteland, a mindset, heaven," guitarist Joe Langridge- Brown told The Sun. "The album uses this club to talk about the types of club in the real world: celebrity, Media, the music industry, social standing, political movements. They're everywhere."
  
  This song serves as an introduction to the album.
• Dead Club City is a concept record with different characters and stories, but all the songs rely on each other. "'Welcome To The DCC,' sets it up," explained Langridge-Brown. "It's an advertising campaign for the fictional members-only club."
• Nothing But Thieves released "Welcome To The DCC" as the lead single from Dead City Club on March 16, 2023. They penned it about midway through the writing process when they were messing with the idea of concepts.
  
  "You start out with album four, so what is a rock band do? They go 'concept.' So, it's very cliché, isn't it?" the band told BBC Radio 1's Clara Amfo. "And then about halfway through, we wrote this sort of advertisement to this world that we've created, Dead Club City. You have to really like lead with this song, it's the advertisement, it's the sort of like the welcome to the place."
• Joseph Langridge-Brown wrote "Welcome To The DCC" with vocalist Conor Mason and keyboardist Dominic Craik alongside British songwriter-producers Julian Emery and Jim Irvin (Lissie, Michelle Branch). Craik also co-produced the song with Jonathan Gilmore.
• The pandemic gave the band a lot of time to experiment, and they landed on a more synthy, rhythmically orientated, cinematic sound. "That's kind of how I hear a concept record, that sort of expanse - which really made sense with this city vibe," Langridge- Brown told Apple Music.
  
  For this song, the riff after the intro transformed dramatically in the studio. "It had more of a Justice thing before, but then it turned into this Prince-style thing," explained Langridge-Brown. "With Conor's vocal, as well, that was a big consideration. More '80s-style stuff is what we're referencing a lot."
• Dead Club City debuted at #1 on the UK albums chart. It was Nothing But Thieves' first-ever visit to the summit. Their 2017 release, Broken Machine, was their previous best chart-placing, peaking at #2.
• BBC Radio 1 listeners voted "Welcome to the DCC" as the Hottest Record of the Year. Olivia Rodrigo's "Vampire" came second and Miley Cyrus's "Flowers" third.
  
  Though it only reached #97 on the UK Singles chart, it received plenty of airplay on Radio 1's playlist.
• The song became an unofficial anthem of BBC Radio 1's Big Weekend event when DJs playfully altered the lyrics to "Welcome to the DCC - Dundee City Council" as a nod to the host city.