04/17/2024
NEWS RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April, 2024
NW Punk & Power Pop Worx (NWPPP) to release an album in the fall of 2024 of a complete live concert from November, 1979 by legendary Seattle power pop band THE HEATS
SEATTLE, WA. - The Heats, the classic power pop band of the late `70s and early `80s, in collaboration with NW Punk & Power Pop/NWPPP (The first for the new offshoot label for NW Metalworx Music - https://nwmetalworxmusic.com). A complete live show originally broadcast from the famous Showbox Theater on Thanksgiving weekend in 1979.
Bio: The origins of The Heats began with a chance encounter in 1975. A guitarist/songwriter named Don Short was hitchhiking and found himself at a Jack in the Box restaurant. There he met another aspiring guitarist/songwriter named Steve Pearson in the drive-thru lane. They sparked up a conversation about music, found a common love for the British Invasion bands (The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Who, The Kinks, etc.). They exchanged phone numbers and parted ways. A couple of years later, drummer Ken Deans and bassist Keith Lilly were trying to put a band together with a female singer for the purpose of going to Alaska to play gigs. Both musicians had been friends since they were in kindergarten and had played in glam and hard rock bands. Ken and Keith had gone to Inglemoor High School with Steve Pearson and asked him if he would want to jam with this group they were forming. Steve took a pass on Alaska, but invited the two to his trailer home to listen to some songs that he was working on. The guitarist played early versions of Some other Guy, When you’re Mine and She don’t Mind. Steve told his future rhythm section about another guitarist/singer he knew and invited Don Short to jam. On Thanksgiving eve of 1978, they reconvened at a rehearsal space below a convenience store in Kenmore called “The Night and Day.” The band started that evening off by jamming British Invasion and Chuck Berry cover tunes. Once warmed up, songwriters Pearson & Short introduced original material to the band and by the next morning, they had come up with 6 or 7 original songs.
It wasn't long before the band had 60 songs in their repertoire (of which ten were originals) and set out to play their first live gig. They called themselves “The Heaters,” inspired by the space heaters that kept them warm in their frigid rehearsal room. The band immediately started to gig, doing small shows to work out their originals live but also introduced many exciting and relatively unknown cover tunes from British artists like Nick Lowe, Dave Edmunds, Dr. Feelgood, Elvis Costello and American songwriter, Garland Jeffreys. These songs blended in with their originals, created potent live performances that had their audiences growing throughout the region. They also caught the ears of local music writers Eric Lacitis and Pat McDonald, who would go on to often write glowing reviews of the band’s live performances, stage chemisty that literally made The Heats overnight NW sensations, hoping to soon take the national stage by storm. The band was proclaimed as “the next big thing.” The band was high energy, no frills and wrote songs about teenage angst. Deans and Lilly locked into a hard driving dance beat. Pearson and Short’s vocal harmonies were like that of the Everly Brothers, while their call and response guitars crunched like Keith Richards and Dave Davies.
The Heaters played 5 nights a weeks at most of the well known venues across Washington, Oregon, Idaho and British Columbia. The Shire, Astor Park, Seattle Center Amphitheater, Hall of Fame, Back Forty Tavern, Ad Lib Tavern, Hibble & Hydes, Town Pump, Natascha’s, Harpo’s, etc. They even got the hot slots opening up for movies like, Girl Can’t Help it and Rock n’ Roll High School, at the Edmonds Theater in the summer of 1979. The band was ready to make the leap to vinyl but found out that the name, The Heaters, was already register by copyright to another group. The Gears and The Torpedoes were bandied about, but eventually they took the moniker, “The Heats” prior to entering the studio. In 1980, The Heats released their power pop anthem, “I Don’t Like your Face” and this single sold over 18,000 copies. The song encapsulated the band perfectly. They would go on to release their first album, Have an Idea, that sold well regionally at 15,000 copies. The band played several high visibility shows with The Kinks at the Paramount Theater and Chuck Berry at the Coliseum in Seattle. They toured the west coast with the Knack, and opened up for Heart at Radio City Music Hall in New York and In Los Angeles at the famous Whiskey A Go Go. Even with a push from the local star power of Buck Ormsby of the Wailers and Ann & Nancy Wilson of Heart, the promise of realizing national fame eluded the band. Keith Lilly and Ken Deans moved on from the band by the end of 1981. The Heats soldiered on a couple more of years, releasing 2 more singles and a second album called Burning Live. They ended their run as “the Northwest’s hottest band” on December 31, 1983 at Seattle’s premier nightclub, Astor Park. Ken Deans would say in an interview years later that, “he believed the reason that the Heats never got that big recording contract was that the band wasn’t punk enough for the punk crowd and weren’t pop enough for the top 40 crowd.”
The music from the Thanksgiving 1979 show from the Showbox Theater was first released as a download from Tom Dyer’s Green Monkey Records in 2011. The original source material for the concert was originally taped off the radio by longtime fan, Howie Wahlen. He recalls, “There was a live radio broadcast coming up soon after the Shire show on Thanksgiving Day 1979. This required some thought because where I lived and where my parents lived had really crappy Seattle FM radio reception. There were hills in the way of the radio signals. My brother Brian and I conspired to eat Thanksgiving dinner at my parents home with the family and then go to his dorm at the University of Washington, which had way better FM reception, in time to record The Heaters live at the Showbox. It had almost everything their live show had, except the smoke, beer & bodies. This would do very well until they released an album. In some ways I prefer it still.” Additional engineering/restoration and remastering done by Tony Reed at Heavy Head Studios.
N.W. Punk & Power Pop/NWPP is proud to release this watershed concert on a double vinyl LP set with gatefold sleeve and CD, 45 years after it was performed. This release has been licensed by Ken Deans with the support of Tom Dyer and Howie Wahlen. This show stands the test of time and is as fresh today as when the kids were sweating and dancing their asses off in the Showbox. Preorders coming soon at: https://nwmetalworxmusic.com and will be available this fall at many of your favorite local stores.
