Shoes - Black Vinyl Shoes Illinois' Shoes have penned their fair share of power pop classics and their unquestionably great album Present Tense has been written up here as well but their "debut" deserves a shout as well. While its hardly mentionable that a band
home records an album these days, most albums cut to four track in 1977 never made it past being shopped around as demos. However, when Shoes took their 15-track set of demos around they sparked the interest of PVC Records who thought that the album had merit as it stood, and right they were. The recordings aren't as slick as they might have been if they'd had a full studio treatment but that adds to the bare soul, heart-on-sleeve songs that would come to act as Shoes templates. The band was forced to rely on the hooks and harmonies rather than impressing anyone with the flash of recording (though for four kids in a living room this is damn fine work). The record did lead them to a major label deal and the aforementioned classic sophomore album but there's still room on the shelf for the sparkling fun of Black Vinyl Shoes in any power pop collection. Download: [MP3] Shoes - Boys Don't Lie Support the artist, buy it HERE