Thursday, August 09, 2012

An Early Clue to the New Direction: Special Where Are the Italian Guys? Edition

Okay, if you've been hanging around here for any length of time, you are doubtless aware of my fondness for the work of The (Young) Rascals.

However, even a crazed fan like myself would be hard put to characterize their music as the sort of thing that is normally our purview, i.e. power pop. That said, I happened to hear the Rascals' "See" (which may have been their last major chart hit, if memory serves) on the radio somewhere the other day and I thought -- hey, that sounds kind of like the stuff that Todd Rundgren did later with Nazz.

Which is to say that, yeah, "See" is of course your basic piece of AM radio psychedelia, but given the riffage and stuff, it almost verges on power pop territory; in fact, you could do a pretty seamless segue out of the song and into "Open My Eyes." Or vice versa, come to think of it.

In any case, a coveter PowerPop No-Prize will be awarded to the first reader who gleans the song's relevance to the theme of tomorrow's Weekend Listomania.

8 comments:

Sal Nunziato said...

You know, I LOVE The Rascals and Todd Rundgren, right? I never would have heard the Nazz connection. You are so right.

So my guess...last good track before questionable career move?

FD13NYC said...

Groups that went from Little Rascal costumes to growing facial hair?

steve simels said...

Heh.

And heh.



Also, no.
:-)

FD13NYC said...

Groups with a lot of teeth?

buzzbabyjesus said...

I love this song, but a 2 and a half minute version would have overstayed it's welcome less.

JZ said...

Agree with the above, sounds a shade too long these days, but they were stretching them out in '69. It's a fine rocker though, and was a good way for the original line up of the group to go out.

Unknown said...

Considering you featured a song called "See" and mentioned a song called "Open My Eyes", I'm guessing your topic will be vision.

Anonymous said...

Ooohh! Great tune! I remember putting on the album and when See kicked in, it was like - wow, what the heck is this!?!? Excellent selection...thanks!