The roster of bands
Mitch Easter produced at his fabled Drive-In Studios throughout the '80s is utterly staggering, and as far as I'm concerned bottomless, given that I'm still stumbling upon more vintage college rock records that have his name adorning back sleeves, as is the case with Richmond, VA exports
Not Shakespeare. I can't say this trio had a very heavy handed REM or Let's Active inflection to them, but still a relatively recognizable Mitch Easter production. It's more Cactus World News than dBs if you get my drift. "Get Well Soon" would have fit in snugly on a Red Rockers album. Overall, immensely satisfying if not particularly innovative.
A Complete Bunch of Pants blog has some kinds words to extol on them, including a brief mention of a NS tape titled
Not for Sale, and another 12" ep that followed this one. My apologies for the pesky vinyl static and snaps.
01. Get Well Soon
02. Heaven
03. Turnaround
04. Susan
Hear
18 comments:
have you heard his latest production, the band Big Troubles? here is a link in case you have not:
http://stereogum.com/817752/stream-big-troubles-romantic-comedy/mp3s/
Thanks. I've been onto Big Troubles for a month or so, but haven't heard the album yet. Promising band.
I did a piece on them for BTO, there's a funny fanboy story....
As I recall, Not Shakespeare won some kind of Unsigned Band competition sponsored by a candy bar company. Too bad more didn't come of that.
Thank you very much. You rock.
Comments are appreciated as always. It's what I live for...maybe.
Nice review. I don't know some of the bands you mention in the review, but your schoolings are appreciated.
Just listened to Not Shakespeare on Youtube. Sounds somewhat like 1983's The Sharks from York, Pennsylvania.
The live song was catchy. Then listened to Big Troubles, "Misery" which was very cool also.
Mnay thankx for this. All the best.
I had the song "Turnaround" on an old cassette tape from college radio in 1988. I recently had someone identify the band and the song for me. Good to finally know about them. Their sound was fantastic!
I had the song "Turnaround" on an old cassette tape from college radio in 1988. I recently had someone identify the band and the song for me. Good to finally know about them. Their sound was fantastic!
They won the first ever MTV best unsigned band in America contest. They won the record deal to get this album done.
They were from Blacksburg, VA too, not Richmond.
I know because I grew upon Blacksburg and the band leader George pretty much ran the local live music scene in the town for a decade at least afterwards (much to my bands chagrin).
They won the first ever MTV best unsigned band in America contest. They won the record deal to get this album done.
They were from Blacksburg, VA too, not Richmond.
I know because I grew upon Blacksburg and the band leader George pretty much ran the local live music scene in the town for a decade at least afterwards (much to my bands chagrin).
Thanks for posting this! Just randomly did a search for the band, wanting to be taken back to my Virginia Tech days. As is mentioned by other posters, "The Not" were pretty much always playing in the late 80s at the South Main Cafe, and I saw them at least a dozen times. I learned about other great music through their well chosen covers.
I don't know your policy on re-upping links, but this one has been (sadly) deleted 'due to inactivity' - any chance for a re-up for this, please? I would greatly appreciate it. Thanks!
The link has just been updated. Thanks for alerting us.
I found a CD at a thrift store called Life Fest. Not Shakespeare is on it along with other VT scene bands. It's really well done!
Can you please re-update the link? Thanks!
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