The dB's:
Stands for deciBels
THE dB’s TO RE-RELEASE DEBUT ALBUM, STANDS FOR DECIBELS,
ON PROPELLER SOUND RECORDINGS ON JUNE 6
FIRST TIME ON VINYL IN U.S.
FOR INFLUENTIAL AMERICAN INDIE-ROCK ALBUMBand will soon announce a fall US reunion tourThe dB’s’ debut album Stands for deciBels, will be reissued on CD, vinyl (its first time on vinyl in the US) and all digital platforms on June 6, 2024, through Propeller Sound Recordings.The first digital single will be “Big Brown Eyes,” due out on April 26, followed by “Cycles Per Second” on May 17. Both will be available on streaming services. On album street date, June 6, a third single, “Black & White,” will follow, both audio and video.The album was originally produced by the late Alan Betrock, founder of the seminal post-punk publication, NY Rocker, with Mitch Easter, Scott Litt and Martin Rushent mixing. It was originally issued in 1981 on the UK-based Albion label.Pitchfork cited Stands for deciBels among its list of 100 Top Albums of the 1980s. AllMusic applauded “ a reverence for British pop and arty post-punk leanings . . . rarely is experimentation so enjoyable and irresistibly catchy" and said The dB’s were “the band that bridged the gap between classic '70s power pop . . . and the jangly new wave of smart pop personified by R.E.M.”In late summer, the band will announce a fall multi-format reissue of its second album, Repercussion, whose street date will correlate with an extremely rare American reunion tour – details of which are still coming together. The last dB’s national tour was in 2012 on the heels of their studio album of that year, Falling Off the Sky.FOR FANS OF:
R.E.M., Big Star, The Soft Boys, Alex Chilton, and Nick Lowe
Stands for deciBels will be available on:
+Limited Edition Black & White Split Color Vinyl
+CD will include the bonus track “Judy,” a single not included on the original release but available on a late ‘80s (long out-of-print) I.R.S. Records CD reissue.
TRACK LISTING
01 Black and White
02 Dynamite
03 She’s Not Worried
04 The Fight
05 Espionage
06 Tearjerkin’
07 Cycles per Second
08 Bad Reputation
09 Big Brown Eyes
10 I’m in Love
11 Moving in Your Sleep
12 Judy [CD/Digital Only]
The dB's: Press Praise
“The missing link between the proto-power pop of Big Starand the college rock of R.E.M...an unheralded gem”. The dB’s carved out a nice little niche in the genre of power pop while straddling the line between punk and new wave.” -
Pop Matters“[T]he dB’s combined a reverence for British pop and arty post-punk leanings that alternate between minimalism and a love of quirky embellishment, odd sounds, and unexpected twists; Stands for deciBels is clearly a collegiate pop experiment, but rarely is experimentation so enjoyable and irresistibly catchy”
All Music
The dB's: Bio
The dB’s were singer/songwriters Peter Holsapple and Chris Stamey along with Gene Holder on bass and Will Rigby on drums. The foursome grew up in Winston-Salem, NC and helped define what would become the rich North Carolina indie-rock scene of the ‘80s but emigrated to New York in the late 1970s, frequently appearing at CBGB, Maxwell’s and other influential venues. The band’s early history is well documented on Propeller Sound Recordings’ celebrated 2021 release by The dB’s I Thought You Wanted To Know (1978-1981).“This was primarily a band-produced and arranged record, recorded old-school analog in fits and starts at the dawn of what became ‘indie,’ with producer Alan Betrock as an éminence grise to intermittently steady the ship. And after we'd filled up all 16 of the tracks on all the songs with a cornucopia of ideas, we lucked out: aces Scott Litt(at Power Station, NYC), Don Dixon (at Drive-In, NC) and Martin Rushent (at Genetic, UK) joined to help mix,” Chris Stamey said.“We recorded it in the rundown Manhattan of 1979, in the aftermath of the CBGB explosion, when ‘anything goes’ was the rule; we were Southern expats playing on bills with the likes of the Feelies, Bush Tetras, and X, but felt a special camaraderie with a few of the more musically versatile yet still rebellious bands of the time, the Soft Boys, NRBQ, and the Attractions among them,” he added.The dB’s drummer Will Rigby recalls the 44-year journey in getting vinyl to American fans via a domestic label: “There were no takers among US record labels, so it wound up being released on UK label Albion Records in several European countries plus Japan and Australia, but not in North America. Its history since has included a US release on CD, but this is the first time it has been released on LP in the United States.”“Stands for deciBels was the first place many people heard The dB’s – thanks to intrepid college deejays who brought their personal copies into the stations. Hopefully those old disc jockeys can now replace their original copies with pristine new ones,” says Peter Holsapple.Propeller Sound Recordings co-owner Jefferson Holt noted: “It was a natural fit for us to reissue these incredible dBs albums for old fans and to create new ones. I think these two albums are two of the greatest albums in all of rock ‘n roll.”Musicologist / country music historian Tyler Mahan Coe cited the band’s track “Dynamite” from the Stands for deciBels album and commented on X(Twitter) the following: "Any time someone is talking about their favorite rock band ever I just pretend they said a bunch of sh*t about how great The dBs were because that’s the band they’d be talking about if they knew anything.”
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