#db's

We return tonight with a throwback episode chock full of power pop goodness from one of the original and still vital groups from back in the day. The db’s are currently touring behind the reissue of their 1981 album “Stands for Decibels”, and it’s the original lineup too! So that’s where we begin the evening and continue on from there with other complimentary material from likeminded folks! We close out Side B with a couple tribute tunes to our RadioRadioX colleague and all around raconteur Johnny Mystery. Deets to follow..

Side A

Howling at the Moon-Hank Williams Bad Reputation-db’s Black and White-db’s Amplifier-db’s That Time is Gone-db’s I Thought You Should Know-Richard Lloyd & db’s Take Me Home and Make Me Like It-Alex Chilton Don’t Tell Me-Incredible Casuals Wild Weekend-NRBQ

Side B

I wanna go back to 1987 for this show.

Death of Rock: Peter Holsapple vs. Alex Chilton is an aural snapshot of what amounts to two power pop giants passing like ships in the night.  This is also the second posthumous Alex Chilton related release I can think of where the man almost plays the antagonist on his own record.  This is something that I imagine would have amused Chilton quite a bit if he were still around, and who’s to say that it isn’t right now somewhere out there on the astral plane.  The release frames soon to be dB, Peter Holsapple on the way in, and former Big Star, Alex Chilton on the way out for parts unknown.

Holsapple’s matter of fact liner notes do an excellent job of recalling his misadventures as a young musician chasing a bit of the Big Star magic by geographic means.  That essence he found on those albums however proved to be a bit elusive for him.  Finding himself in Memphis, TN circa 1978 unable to land Chris Bell as a producer, and the object of a fair amount of scorn by a lot of the locals with Bell’s former bandmate Alex Chilton included among them was probably not his ideal scenario.  Nevertheless, the Big Star acolyte soldiered on, and soon found himself recording at Sam Phillips’ studio when a recently punk informed Chilton dropped in on one of his sessions to show him how he thought it should be done.  At this time, Chilton’s muse was as far from the Beatlesque sounds of his former group as could probably be humanly possible.  Whether Chilton’s goal in showing up that evening was to showcase his new shambolic approach to music, to be a bit of troll to the kid who worshipped at the altar of his former band, to push Holsapple in a different musical direction, or some perverse combination of all of the above isn’t exactly clear.  It won’t ever be.  At any rate, it didn’t seem like a very comfortable situation for the new kid in town.

The album is neatly split between off kilter Chilton tunes and a clutch of embryonic gems from Holsapple. What’s documented here provides an interesting sideways view into both Chilton and Holsapple’s musical evolution along with some fresh perspectives into some of their best works. For Chilton, that’s the ramshackle deconstruction of Like Flies on Sherbert, and for Holsapple, it’s a direct lead in to his work with the dB’s.  For fans of sideways late ‘70′s Memphis punk, or jangle pop, there are some interesting nuggets captured here that one could say were definitely worth the trip to Memphis.