Lowery was born in San Antonio, Texas, the son of a career Air Force father. He has described his parents as "a hillbilly and an English working-class woman." His family moved around a great deal during his youth before finally settling in Redlands, California, where he attended high school. He became involved in music as a member of the bandSitting Ducks, who played a mixture of punk and acid rock, along with what Lowery described as "fake Russian-sounding music." Sitting Ducks subsequently evolved into Camper Van Beethoven, formed in 1983 in Santa Cruz, California. The band is best known for its cover of the Status Quo song "Pictures of Matchstick Men" from the Key Lime PieLP and its original composition "Take the Skinheads Bowling," from the band's 1985 debut LP, Telephone Free Landslide Victory, later featured in the Michael Moore movie Bowling for Columbine. In the early 1990s, Lowery formed Cracker with guitarist and long-time friend Johnny Hickman and bassist Davey Faragher. Cracker rejected the indie-rock sound of Camper Van Beethoven in favor of a more traditional, roots-rock sound. Cracker's biggest hits are "Teen Angst " from its eponymous LP, released in 1992, and "Low," from 1993's Kerosene Hat. Cracker continues to perform today, although Camper Van Beethoven has also reformed, releasing a cover of the entire Fleetwood Mac album Tusk in 2002 and several new albums of original music, beginning with New Roman Times in 2004. Lowery has also done work as a producer at Sound of Music Studios in Richmond, Virginia, working on records by Sparklehorse, Counting Crows, Lauren Hoffman, September 67, Wormburner, LP, Tea Leaf Green, Magnet, Sons of Bill and others. Lowery, along with Ian Solla-Yates of WNRN started RadioVA with Sound of Music in May 2010, an interview program hosted by David that has featured The Hold Steady, Drive-By Truckers, Minus the Bear and Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros. On September 13, 2010, David married Velena Vego. Vego has been the manager for both Cracker and Camper Van Beethoven since 2004. She is also the talent booker for the 40 Watt Club in Athens, Georgia, and Buckhead Theatre in Atlanta.
Other activities
Lowery is a trained mathematician who has worked as a "quant" and has started a number of music-related businesses, including a studio, a record company and a publishing company. Lowery's extensive experience in business led to his appointment as a lecturer in the University of Georgia's music business program. Lowery earned an Ed.D. from the University of Georgia in 2018. Charles Pitter at PopMatters has said that "in addition to this work, Lowery teaches as a lecturer and has a consistently high profile in the media as a champion of artists rights. As such, it could almost be said that Lowery has become the voice of a generation; however, it seems likely he would dismiss this title as meaningless blabber." Lowery is critical of the internet era and states that things might be worse for working musicians than under the old record system. In 2012, he gave a widely shared talk called "Meet the new boss, worse than the old boss" in which he criticized Pandora Radio for low songwriter royalties, claiming to have made less than $17 from a million streams of his song "Low." In January 2019, Lowery settled a lawsuit against Napster, which concerned unpaid mechanical royalties.
