Purchase GET LOOSE on vinyl here:
shakinhipsrecords.com/product/986358

-------

My original Stivs bandmates and I tried to make a record back in 2003. We had a group of songs we were completely jazzed about, but our attempts at recording them failed miserably. Those recordings were released on compact disc as an album called The Beat Is Loose. Thankfully the album wasn't around long. Our performances were marred by severely poor production and mix choices. We felt like we were a cool band, but man...that one just didn't have it. We knew the album didn't represent us well so we literally pretended that it didn't exist. I remastered it a few years ago (released digitally as The Beat Is Looser), but it was still hard to listen to.

We did manage to rectify things in 2005 with our Sweet Heartache And The Satisfaction album. (Recorded in Seattle by Jack Endino.) That album remains in the upper echelon of my favorite recorded career moments.

Fast forward to 2017...missing that old Stivs sound, I got together with Wes Griffith, a fantastic human being and musician I'd known since the late '90s, and started discussing putting together a new Stivs lineup. By 2019, we had my childhood best friend, Jim Kennedy, singing for us and Joey and Cory from a great punk band I knew called Standard Bearer on bass and drums. Using the entire Sweet Heartache And The Satisfaction album as our setlist, we began playing shows. Covid put us and most every other band out of commission for a while, but when the dust settled, we picked up mostly where we left off (Joey had a growing family and couldn't continue with us so we got Edwin for a bit, followed by the permanent addition of the fabulous Johnny D, bassist extraordinaire!).

Hungry for new material, we started writing new songs and we also started rehearsing some of the older Stivs songs and even added a few into the set. We discussed making a new record and, from time to time, Wes would tell me how much he liked those Beat Is Loose era songs. After first brushing such talk aside, I started to listen with fresh ears. I remembered the joy I felt when the original band had started playing those songs. Even though we hated the way the album sounded, I knew they were good songs and I began wondering if it would make sense to do a complete do-over...a mulligan so to speak. I called a band meeting and pitched the idea. I told them that I believed it to be the perfect way to bridge the gap between the original era of the band and this new one. "Let's redo The Beat Is Loose and THEN do an all new record!" The guys thought the idea had merit, so we booked studio time.

Three of the songs from the original recording were actually recorded again for the Sweet Heartache And The Satisfaction album. Two of those we felt were perfectly done on that album and we saw no reason to record them again (Hi Five 4 Jive and This Is It). We had added a super cool, extended mid-section to Movement Movement and feeling the Sweet Heartache version of it lacked the groove and spirit of the original, we decided to go ahead and redo it. This meant we needed two more numbers. Wes wrote lyrics and and a melody to an instrumental originally on the Reaction Jackson album called Four On The Floor (retitled now as Back Alley Rock 'N' Roll) and, after fleshing it out a bit, we felt good about its inclusion. Wes then mentioned that his wife, Robynn, had said she'd love for us to play the Johnny Thunders' classic, I Wanna Be Loved. We rehearsed it and immediately all agreed that it needed to be on the album, too.

Since we all loved the way my Jonni Walker And The Satisfaction album, 818, turned out, we decided to assemble the exact same team for this one. Drums were tracked at OrionStudios in Baltimore before heading up to Cactus Arm in Mechanicsburg, PA to record everything else. To ensure no stones were left unturned, we constantly AB'd the new recordings with the originals. There were a couple overdubs recorded at Blackway Studios as well (thanks Josh!).

Once everything was recorded, we sent the tapes to Perry at Point Break Sound for mixing. His genius and talent can be heard throughout this record...we can't thank him enough for those golden ears of his!

We now have a final product in hand that we are all incredibly proud of. We hope you'll take a moment to check it out.

I'd like to take one final moment here to thank my former Stivs mates for giving this record their blessing. We hope it makes you all smile to think back to a time when we were young (even me!).

Cliffy