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ivan@stellysee.de
| From | Steve Alter <shteevea@yahoo.com> |
| Subject | Re: My Own Top 200 (long) |
| Date | Fri, 25 Jan 2008 16:55:55 -0800 (PST) |
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Well that's the rub, ain't it? :-)
It all depends on which catechism you're reading from at any given time. SSA includes records from bands like Feel (really AOR) and The Click Five (boy band bubblegum), which I like well enough, but excludes The Bangles and others as not really power pop. On the flip side, you include The Vapors, East Side Story and Zenyatta Mondatta, which I totally dig, but wouldn't include in the "the truest definition of the genre." Which is...?
If I was gonna get all religious about it, I'd say it has to tie back to the early Beatles, Who, Kinks and Roger McGuinn's guitar. Which gets you, say ,The Raspberries, The Posies, Cheap Trick, Shoes, The Records, Matthew Sweet, Marshall Crenshaw, etc. It'll get you Radio City, but not necessarily #1 Record, which sounds closer to Poco or Wet Willie in spots than the Beatles (which is not a criticism, BTW.)
As for the albums below, I don't see a power pop collection not having the Dixon (right alongside Nick Lowe's first two solo albums, and the one truly egregious omissions in SSA - unless it's in there and I keep missing it) or Marti Jones debut, which is like a dBs cover album, for goodness sakes. I think The Indescribable Wow is one of the best Beatles albums ever; T Bone Burnett compresses their entire recoding career into about 38 minutes. Todd? "Couldn't I Just Tell You" may be THE quintessential power pop song, right up there with "Go All the Way," and the diversity of both of those albums feels very power pop to me for some reason. Never understood the resistance to Aimee Mann as power pop, at least this and I'm With Stupid, which are largely cowritten by Jon Brion and full of hooks and jangle. (Which reminds me, let's add Rhett Miller's The Instigator to the list.) If you question the Freedy album, he left off a golder cover of Matthew Sweet's "I'll Be
Waiting," which shows where his heart lies (as do "Evie's Tears" and "Two Lovers Stop"). I can be talked out of Syd Straw and ARB, though they both contain stellar power pop moments.
Lest you think I'm ignoring any and all definitions, classic pop albums I haven't tossed in include Prefab Sprout's Steve McQueen (maybe my #1 album) or Jordan the Comback, as well as Harry Nilsson. Can't say exactly why, though obviously "power" is largely missing, but I couldn't add them to this list.
Discuss, debate, flame!
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