{"id":23179,"date":"2022-06-22T05:30:40","date_gmt":"2022-06-22T09:30:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=23179"},"modified":"2022-06-23T10:22:56","modified_gmt":"2022-06-23T14:22:56","slug":"the-dbs-in-black-and-white-part-two","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2022\/06\/22\/the-dbs-in-black-and-white-part-two\/","title":{"rendered":"The dB’s in Black and White (Part Two)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Continued from Part One<\/a>\u2026 <\/i><\/p>\n

A single credited to Chris Stamey and The dB\u2019s featured an a-side (\u201c(I Thought) You Wanted to Know\u201d) played by Stamey with Television\u2019s\u2019 Richard Lloyd, who wrote the tune. \u201cChris wanted to have a band to promote that,\u201d recalls Holder. Individually, he and Rigby had both recently moved from North Carolina to New York. \u201cSo Chris asked if we\u2019d be interested in playing. I said, \u2018Definitely,\u2019 and that\u2019s how we started, the three of us.\u201d The flip, \u201cIf and When,\u201d featured the new trio. The single was released on Stamey\u2019s own indie label, Car Records.<\/p>\n

The three-man dB\u2019s backed a returning Alex Chilton for some New York shows; Gene Holder describes those gigs as \u201ckind of chaotic, but still good.\u201d Similarly, early trio-version dB\u2019s shows were \u2013 according to all participants \u2013 somewhat sloppy and unfocused. \u201cWe did a few gigs that way,\u201d recalls Holder. \u201cThen we decided we needed another person to sort of carry some of the load on stage. We were feeling a little hemmed in by only having the one guitar.\u201d By October 1978, they made a decision to add another musician to the group. \u201cWe got Peter to move up, and that\u2019s where the band really started getting off.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Peter Holsapple had already left North Carolina; his journey first took him to Memphis. He had first discovered Big Star years earlier thanks to Stamey. \u201cChris was the alert ear that heard \u2018When My Baby\u2019s Beside Me\u2019 on WAIR,\u201d he recalls, noting that the fact serves as proof that Big Star\u2019s music really was played on AM radio. Will Rigby concurs, noting that Little Diesel, a Winston-Salem high school-era combo including him and Holsapple, festured \u201cIn the Street\u201d in their set in 1973.<\/p>\n

And it was revelatory for Holsapple, letting him know that there were others who appreciated that kind of music. \u201cYou didn\u2019t feel so alone in the \u2018Midnight Rider\u2019 world,\u201d he quips. As early as 1977 he made a pilgrimage to Memphis, joined by Mitch Easter and Will Rigby. \u201cWe saw Chris Bell at Danver\u2019s restaurant!\u201d he gushes.<\/p>\n

With Bell, Holsapple and his friends dropped in on the sessions for what would become Chilton\u2019s Like Flies on Sherbert<\/i>. Holsapple recalls being taken aside by producer Richard Roseborough, who told him, \u201cThis record is either going to change the face of pop music as we know it, or fail miserably.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t long after that trip that Holsapple went to Memphis a second time \u2013 alone on this trip \u2013 to seek his musical fortunes. \u201cI thought, \u2018Well, maybe if I go back there, a little of that Memphis goodness will rub off on me,\u2019\u201d he says. He secured what he describes as \u201ca shitty job printing t-shirts,\u201d noting that his time in West Tennessee was \u201cthree months of intense heat and humidity.\u201d<\/p>\n

Holsapple did some recording with Roseborough, and he recalls with a laugh what Chilton had to say about those tapes. \u201cI heard what you’re doing with Richard, and it really sucks,\u201d he said. But Chilton offered to come by the studio and \u201cshow [Holsapple] how it\u2019s done.\u201d Those recordings circulate on bootlegs.<\/p>\n

One day while hanging out at the public library \u2013 which was air conditioned \u2013 Holsapple read a piece in the Village Voice<\/i>. \u201cChris Stamey and the dB’s are playing at Max’s. Oh, he’s playing at CBGB! Gosh, that’s great!\u201d Serendipitously, within the next day or two, he got a phone call from Will Rigby: \u201cDo you want to come up and audition to play keyboards?\u201d He didn\u2019t hesitate.<\/p>\n

The morning after attending a Tom Petty show with Walter Egan opening up (\u201cTickets were 98 cents,\u201d he notes) Holsapple was on a plane. \u201cHungover, barf all over my shirt, I flew to Winston-Salem, somehow got on another plane, and went to New York,\u201d he recalls. \u201cWill found me, took me in, and cleaned me up. I went to audition, and I think I passed.\u201d The dB\u2019s were now a foursome.<\/p>\n

The original idea was for Holsapple to play keys with the dB\u2019s playing Stamey\u2019s songs. \u201cBut it became evident fairly quickly that I was coming with a bank of songs,\u201d Holsapple says. His and Chris\u2019s songs were different, but they fit together nicely in a set. Cautioning that it\u2019s a slight generalization, Holder observes that \u201cPeter writes from the heart, and Chris writes from the mind.\u201d There was at least some thought of Mitch Easter joining, too, but his plans to establish a studio didn\u2019t amount to much in a city already filled with top-notch recording facilities, so he soon returned to Winston-Salem.<\/p>\n

\"\"Meanwhile, the new four-man dB\u2019s worked up a full set and started to play gigs around New York City. \u201cWe had our first gig at Irving Plaza on Halloween 1978,\u201d Holsapple recalls, noting that the bill also featured The Fleshtones, The Zantees, a group called The Cyclones, and U.S. Ape. \u201cThere were these five bands,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd we were terrible<\/i>.\u201d<\/p>\n

Chastened by the experience, Holsapple, Stamey, Rigby and Holder re-committed themselves to refining their sound. \u201cWe rehearsed at New York Rocker<\/i> magazine on 5th<\/sup> Avenue, among the stacks of back issues,\u201d Holsapple says. Some of those practices were recorded on a TEAC 2340, and selections from those tapes are featured on the new archival release I Thought You Wanted to Know<\/i>.<\/p>\n

Even with the addition of Holsapple, initially The dB\u2019s still felt like a group led by Stamey, says Rigby. \u201cThe more we worked Peter’s songs into the set, it just became clear that he was an equal force in the band.\u201d He notes that while Stamey continued to be the \u201cmake the phone calls, make things happen\u201d member of the band, the dynamic shifted over the course of 1979 and \u201880. \u201cPeter\u2019s own songs were too strong to keep him long confined to that organ chair, as was his superb guitar playing,\u201d says Stamey.<\/p>\n

Click to continue<\/a>\u2026<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Continued from Part One\u2026 A single credited to Chris Stamey and The dB\u2019s featured an a-side (\u201c(I Thought) You Wanted to Know\u201d) played by Stamey with Television\u2019s\u2019 Richard Lloyd, who […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23203,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[39,41,62],"tags":[529,890,1692,2153,2375],"class_list":["post-23179","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-indie","category-interview","category-rawk","tag-chris-stamey","tag-gene-holder","tag-peter-holsapple","tag-the-dbs","tag-will-rigby","cat-39-id","cat-41-id","cat-62-id","has_thumb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23179","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23179"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23179\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23240,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23179\/revisions\/23240"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23203"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23179"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23179"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23179"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}