The dB’s 2

THE dB’S (Will Rigby)

Actually, I hadn’t heard that old joke about a drummer not having a girlfriend being homeless, but I knew such a drummer. A group of kids from my hometown of Winston-Salem, NC formed a rock band called the dB’s; they were unabashedly Beatlesque in a time period (late 1970’s) when that wasn’t fashionable at all, but they were very talented, particularly at songwriting.

The drummer for the dB’s was and still is Will Rigby, the son of a good friend of my mother’s. Even though they were in a quasi-successful rock band, my mom told me once that Will never could afford an apartment in New York and was always bumming around from apartment to apartment with his friends up there.

Eventually they got a record deal; the critics loved them, and they had decent record sales in England, but not much over here. Then they got another record deal, and then they got yet another record deal – the last time was with R.E.M.’s label I.R.S. Records (which stands for “International Recording Syndicate”, like the band’s name stands for “the decibels”).

That I.R.S. album, The Sound of Music was a slick pop affair that came out in 1987. A lot of bands from the Carolinas were doing well nationally, and everyone expected that to be their breakthrough album. (Original member and ace songwriter Chris Stamey had left the band by then and was trying to establish a solo career). The above is actually the back cover of the album; that’s Will Rigby on the left of course at the drumset, with Peter Holsapple (songwriter and guitarist), Gene Holder (bass guitar – I remember him from my schooldays also), and new member Jeff Beninato (guitar). Fame didn’t happen for them though, although Peter Holsapple started playing a lot with R.E.M. for several years after that. I read recently in Wikipedia that the dB’s have reformed and released a new album in June 2012 called Falling Off the Sky.

(January 2013)