Hook Them Early

Album: dB's, Like This, 1984

Acquired: I bought this at an Everything's a Dollar store at Pembroke Mall in 1987. Best freakin' one dollar and three cents I ever spent.

Best Track: "Spitting in the Wind"

Last Memories: This is the tape I was listening to over and over throughout the York Invitational Tournament in December 1987 and the TCIS Championship in February 1988. I won both. Thank you dB's.

** NON SEQUITIR ALERT **

The dB's are the band every southern college rock band you could name wanted to be. It is certainly no coincidence that chief dB's guitarist and songwriter Peter Holsapple eventually became the fifth member of R.E.M. A master of jangle guitar, propulsive electric organ, and a songwriter nonpareil, Holsapple should probably be the musician all kids want to grow up to be. All he lacks is looks -- think beatnik Gilligan meets Thurston Moore.

At least he married well by hooking up with fabulous after-40 Susan Cowsill of, yep, The Cowsills fame.

Also, both alone and teamed with once and future collaborator Chris Stamey, Holsapple is the best first-line writer in all of rock history. Don't argue with that hyperbolic statement until you check out this cascade of couplets from Side A of Like This:

1. "Love Is for Lovers"

Do you remember when blue was the feeling
Gray was the weather, one was the number?

2. "She Got Soul"

She is not your average girl
Every girl I know is not your average girl

3. "Spitting in the Wind"

I can understand why you'd want a better man
But why you wanna make him outta me?

4. "Lonely Is (As Lonely Does)

Where do lonely people go
You're asking me, you'd think I know
They sadly start rebuilding walls
And quickly, quietly withdraw

6. "Amplifier"

Danny went home and killed himself last night

Track 5, "Not Cool," is a change-up, with its lines of "It's too late, too late to call you/ And if I tried too/ I'd wake you." But other than that, Holsapple just never loses his fastball. Even the change-up sounds like it's delivered by a coked-up former lover. Genius.

Holsapple didn't stop right after he started, either. Any person who can say he or she doesn't recognize him or herself in both roles of the people in "Spitting in the Wind" is delusional or an outright liar:

I can understand why you'd want a better man
But why you wanna make him outta me?
Well, I just muddle along, knowing my right from wrong
Why won't you let me be?

We split apart one cold gray rainy afternoon
And I cried aloud
Now we walk along, apart but strong
Strong enough so that we don't have to stand back in the crowd

Sometimes I feel
I feel like I'm spitting into the wind
Oh I'm spitting into the wind
But I'm learning
Yes I'm learning

My hair stands on end whenever friends mention your name
In pleasant conversation
Well, I don't like to be reminded of what used to be
I don't like the association

Sometimes I feel
I feel like I'm spitting into the wind
Oh I'm spitting into the wind
But I'm learning
Yes I'm learning

I can understand why you'd want a better man
But why do you wanna take it out on me?

Sometimes I feel
Y'know, sometimes
I know I
I feel like I'm spitting into the wind
Oh I'm spitting into the wind
Well I'm spitting into the wind
Yes I'm spitting into the wind

If I appear to be slighting Side B of Like This, I'm only doing so because I don't want to try your patience. Suffice to write that the last five songs on the album can be heard as a suite that begins with a guy who can't understand exactly how he got himself into an f'ed up relationship and ends with a sad trip home on a "White Train" after a failed attempt at reconciliation/revenge.

Maybe that isn't how the second side is supposed to be heard, but it how I interpret what's going on. To change the subject and prevent myself from looking bad, here's a bonus opening from the song "New Gun in Town":

He was not pleased
What he saw made him sick

Up Next: dB's, The Sound of Music, 1987