Holy mother of god.  Who's heard the Nice Boys album?

Self-titled album, out now on Birdman.  It's the new band featuring 
Terry Six, the sole surviving member of the Exploding Hearts, and god 
bless them, but as good as their album was, this is about ten times 
better.  I may even go so far as to call this the best pure power pop 
album released so far this millennium, possibly since Cotton Mather's 
KON-TIKI.  There, I said it.

Seriously, if you were on Audities circa 1996-97, this is pretty much 
*exactly* what we were all looking for then.  Remember all of those 
slightly irritating, navel-gazing threads from back in the day about 
"Well, what *is* power pop exactly?"  We don't need to have those 
anymore.  Because...here.  This is it.

Just go here:

http://www.myspace.com/niceboys

And if you're only going to listen to one, listen to "Johnny Guitar." 
Although while you're there, you should also immediately download the 
non-LP single "You Won't See Me Anymore," which is fantastic.

Although the album art is kind of explicitly mid-'70s, the songs 
themselves sound much more like the UK power poppers from later in the 
decade, specifically the Records, the Motors, the Radio Stars, the 
Yachts, that whole lot.  Pretty much none of the punky side of the 
Exploding Hearts, but there's that same kind of freshness: this is 
definitely a record from 2006.

The only way this won't be near the top of Mike Bennett's poll is if 
not enough people hear this by the end of January.  Honestly, it's 
pretty much the canonical Audities record.

S