Influential Debut Album By The dB’s To Be Reissued And Accessible On Vinyl For The First Time

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Stands For deciBels, the 1981 debut from the dB’s, didn’t make a lot of a business impression, nevertheless it enthralled a small legion of college-rock loyalists quickly to swoon over bands like R.E.M., whose members are among the many many who cite the LP as an inspiration.

Ask a dB why the file has endured, and also you get a easy reply.

“We hope that the prime quality of our music is what has stored this album beloved by many,” says drummer Will Rigby. (Singer/guitarists Peter Holsapple and Chris Stamey and bassist Gene Holder spherical out the quartet.) “It has a sound all its personal. The number of materials is a robust level. The songs don’t sound like one another.”

That’s positively true, and listening to it in 2024, it’s not obscure its enchantment. The file is a deft mixture of jangly energy pop (the terrific opening “Black And White”) and off-kilter, quirky fare just like the new-wave-y “Dynamite” (the one track credited to the whole band; the opposite tracks had been penned by both Holsapple or Stamey).

Folks of a sure age are seemingly be thrilled, then, to study that Stands For deciBels has been remastered and will probably be obtainable digitally on June 7 and on CD and vinyl (the latter for the primary time within the U.S.) on June 14 through Propeller Sound Recordings. The LP was recorded in New York Metropolis in 1979 and launched in the UK after the Winston-Salem, N.C., band didn’t get a label deal right here. That explains why no vinyl initially, however what’s the explanation for doing it now?

“Propeller Sound Recordings aspires to convey all the dB’s recordings again into print,” says Rigby. “We’ll see if that occurs, however their curiosity was the ‘propelling’ occasion.”

Additional plans embrace a reissue of Repercussion, the follow-up, additionally surprisingly from 1981, in addition to the unique lineup taking part in reveals within the fall. These dates are being finalized, however the first gig will probably be on the Hopscotch Music Competition in Raleigh, N.C., in early September.

Requested once more in regards to the legacy of Stands For deciBels, Rigby is pragmatic greater than something.

“We had been thrilled to have an album out, irrespective of how obscure it remained on the time,” he says. “We had been pleased with the general album, though there are at all times issues we hear that we want we may redo or have performed in a different way. Largely, we want it was higher recorded … however we’re pleased with our music and glad that it’s nonetheless being listened to almost half a century later.”

—Matt Hickey

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