The Shades - Time For Change

A. Time For Change


B. Shake It


THE SHADES (St Petersburg, FL)
Time For Change b/w Shake It
Direct Hit (DH-001), 1980

Dennis Dalcin started playing guitar, writing songs and singing in bands in 1972. His first project was called Bite with drummer Guy Silvestro. They ended up forming an Alice Cooper meets The Who type band called The Look a couple years later.

Around the same time, Gary Heslin was playing drums with guitarist Terry Carolan in renowned Tampa glam band, Amnesia. By '76 Dennis and Gary had both joined Terry's new group, Just Boys. After just a brief stint in that group, Dennis wanted to form his own band.

He found a bass player named Marla Misenheimer who had been in the Snails with Richard Barone, who later went on to lead The Bongos. With Marla on board, Dennis then called on Gary, who had just left Just Boys, and the three of them began The Shades. Flustered yet? Me too!

They started picking up shows when they could get them (their first one opening for Just Boys). There wasn't much of a scene going on in the St. Pete/Tampa area yet, so most of their gigs were at nearby campuses, playing to apathetic audiences.

At first, the band was heavily influenced by the glam rock scene of New York and London. But when Gary left the group in '78, Dennis changed gears toward a more mod look and sound, heavily laced in the Jam and early Who stylings.

The new line-up consisted of Dennis' old band mate Guy Silvestro on drums and Guy's brother-in-law Ed Siersema on bass. Guy was also a sax player and sometimes at shows would stick the sax between his legs and play the drums with his left hand while wailing on the sax using his right. The people of Tampa Bay weren't quite ready for that yet. However, a neighbor of Dennis believed in what they were doing and shelled out the money to produce a single for the band.

In July, 1980, they recorded "Time For Change" and "Shake It" in a 4 track studio next to Paragon Music. 1,000 copies of the single were released on Dennis' Direct Hit label in a sleeve he put together in art class at graphics school. The single sold well despite not receiving any local airplay. In fact, most of the copies sold outside of Florida.

The band members started going their separate ways and playing different styles of music after that. Guy played in various punk bands, while Dennis formed Perfect Strangers, followed by The Petal Pushers, and most recently, The Lears, who have a CD out on Get Hip. Ed became a geologist.