Friday, February 14, 2025

La Fin de la Semaine Essay Question: Special "Hello Young Lovers You're Under Arrest" Edition

Hey, it's Valentines Day!

And in its honor, from 2025 and their fab/gear just released new album Aces Eights & Heartreaks, please enjoy The Shang Hi Los and the sublimely 80s/Blondie-ish confection that is their "Monsieur Valentine."

Seriously -- that gets my vote for Best Song of the Year so far.

In any case, you can find out more about those kids -- including where to buy/hear more of the album -- over at their official website HERE.

And of course, all that leads us to the weekend's business. To wit:

...and your favorite (or least favorite) post-Elvis pop/rock/folk/soul/country love-themed song is...???

No arbitrary rules whatsoever -- your song can be happy, sad, directed at a specific object of affection, or just a general kind of lovey-dovey sentiment. However you're feeling today.

Oh, and in case you're wondering, my candidate (and I won't specify whether it's my fave or least) is...

...and ain't that something?

Okay -- what would YOUR nominees be?

And have a great weekend, everybody!!!

Thursday, February 13, 2025

Okay, This Might Be Interesting...

A Led Zeppelin documentary?

In the immortal words of Andrea Martin (as SCTV's programmer Edith Prickley) -- "Could be a hot one!"

BTW, the above is apparently playing in theaters as we speak; my plan is to see it when it shows up on the somewhat smaller (home) screen via Sony, which should be fairly soon. But your mileage may vary.

I should add that I have never been a Zep fan even remotely. But theirs is obviously a hell of a story and-- if memory serves -- I've never seen interviews with either John Bonham or John Paul Jones, so I suspect I'm gonna really enjoy it anyway.

I should also add that I have never owned a Zep album and/or listened to one at home for pleasure...EXCEPT for the last real one (i.e., not a comp of old stuff) they did.

You know -- the one (from 1979) with this absolutely fricking gorgeous song.

Your thoughts?

Wednesday, February 12, 2025

Closed for Monkey Business

Real life in the age of the Pee-wee Hitler© administration has slowed me down. Sorry.

Actual very cool new music up tomorrow, and get ready for Friday's Valentine's Day observance. Trust me, you'll kvell.

Tuesday, February 11, 2025

The Last Great Rock Record?

From 1989, please behold in breathless wonder the much-missed (i.e., where's he been lately?) Tone Lōc and his immortal party classic "Funky Cold Medina."

Oh god, that's just perfect; hilarious lyrics, the cowbell digitally lifted from "Honky-Tonk Women," and those sampled guitars (from Foreigner and Kiss, primarily) which work together like a charm.

Serioiusly, first time I heard that I thought I'd gone to rock-and-roll heaven, and I'm only half-kidding about it being the last great etc.

The irony, of course, is that technically it's a rap record, but that's a subject for a whole 'nother time. 😎

Monday, February 10, 2025

Nancy's Record Collection (and Mine): Special "I'd Forgotten How Much I Loved This Song" Edition

From 1973, please enjoy the smash-hit-in-England-but not-so-much-in-this-country "Everyone's Agreed That Everything Will Turn Out Fine" by Stealer's Wheel.

My god, what a great record (those harmonies! that psychedelic break in the middle!). And to anybody who thinks Stealer's Wheel were nothing more than "Stuck in the Middle..." or a warm-up to Gerry Rafferty's solo career, please to be biting me. 😎

I should add that the 45 version above (which was one of my treasured possessions for years) features a vastly superior arrangement to the version that later wound up on the band's Ferguslie Park LP. Why they re-recorded it I have no idea, as the original is as close to perfection as any record ever gets; as you've heard by now, and as I've said in these precincts before, if "Stuck in the Middle" was the band channeling Dylan, this one is them channeling Revolver and late 60s pop psych in general. Simply gorgeous.

Both versions, however, were produced by the immortal team of Leiber and Stoller, and when is there gonna be a bio-pic on THOSE guys?

Friday, February 07, 2025

La Fin de la Semaine Essay Question: Special "The Golden Age of Graphic Design" Edition

So we finally got around to watching the 2018 documentary BOOM! A Film About the Sonics the other day (that's The Sonics, as in the pioneering Northeast proto-punk band, obviousy, not the video game hedgehog).

The short version: Very entertaining, and one hell of a great story, but it was a bummer to discover that there is, apparently, no extant significant live footage of the band in its early-60s performing heyday.

That said, I was blown away by this early LP cover art of theirs...

...which I had forgotten about, and which is really quite ahead-of-its-time stylish. Especially for an indie record on a small regional label of its day.

And which leads us to the weekend's business. To wit:

And your favorite original cover art/album cover for a rock/pop/soul/blues/folk/comedy/Broadway show/classical LP of the 50's and 60's is...???

No arbitrary rules, except I'm going to enforce the temporaral parameters quite strictly. Which is to say if you try to sneak in something released after the music festival at Altamont, I will come to your house and deliver a severe tongue lashing.

Anyway, my Top Five -- in no particular order -- are....

That Stones LP may be the greatest album cover of anything ever, BTW. And I should add that the title of the book the guy in the top Lenny Bruce album is reading -- Pigs Ate My Roses -- has been making me laugh at inappropriate moments for going on half a century now. 😎

I should also add that Lou Reed's entire career esthetic quite clearly derives from that Paragons/Jesters cover, which I still can't believe was ever actually marketed to 50s doo-wop fans. I mean, wow -- that is without question the most (possibly unintentional) gay thing in world history; it could have just as easily been a jacket for some Grove Press banned-in-Boston smut by Hubert Selby. 😎😎

Alrighty then -- what would YOUR choices be? Discuss.

And have a great weekend, everybody!!!

Thursday, February 06, 2025

An Early Clue to the New Direction: Special "Jingle Jangle Morning" Edition

So I got the just-released vinyl version of the Dylan movie soundtrack over the weekend...

...and take my word for it, it works brilliantly strictly as an album...

...starting with the period-accurate front-and-back sleeves. I gotta tell you, just seeing the old Columbia Records eye logo kind of made my year so far.

BTW, in case you're wondering, the cover is based on this actual Dylan LP.

Pretty cool, no?

Of course, the music is the main attraction, and it's spine-tingling. I'll spare you a longer review, but you get the idea.

I should add that the above is the first new -- non-reissue or vintage/used -- LP I've bought in over 50 years. A factoid which kind of blows my tiny mind. 😎

Meanwhile, a coveted Power Pop No-Prize© will be awarded to the first reader who gleans the above's relevance to the theme of tomorrow's Weekend Essay Question.

Wednesday, February 05, 2025

And Young People By the Millions Ask "What's a Transistor Radio?"

From his forthcoming (end of March) album NYC Made, please enjoy Ricky Byrd and his evocative ode to our collective rock-and-roll adolescences "Transistor Radio Childhood."

Co-produced by living rock-and-roll saint Little Steven Van Zandt.

Okay, that's a little a heavy on the obvious nostalgia tropes, but fuck it -- it works. I mean, I was practically in tears by the time he got to the Cousin Brucie reference. 😎

Byrd, of course, is best known for having played guitar with Joan Jett's Blackhearts for like a zillion years; he's a very interesting guy, and you can find out more about him, as well as order the new album, over at his website HERE.

Okay, I gotta go listen to the song again and sniffle.

PS: Here's some asshole whose name rhymes with Sleeve Nimels, with the aforementioned Cousin Brucie in the hallway at Sirius XM Radio in December 2016.

I was in total "I'm not worthy!" mode, as you can well imagine.

[h/t Molly Duffy]

Tuesday, February 04, 2025

Capt. Al's 21st Century: Part VI -- What's a Nice Transgender Jewish Person Doing in a Place Like This?

[As attentive readers will recall, our old friend (and more important, Friend of PowerPop©) Allan Rosenberg, aka Capt. Al, has been toiling on a series about his fave recent artists for a while now. The first installment of these musical musings, about Feist, appeared here back in July. Now, as promised, here's episode le sixiÚme! Take it away, you old sea doggie!!! -- S.S.]

Welcome to the “Best Rock&Roll Music of the 21st Century, Part VI”, by Captain Al!!!

There are musical artists that challenge my values. Not just musical but even my life values.

In the 1960’s it was the Velvet Underground. I came to LOVE their music but it came with a struggle as I had to reorient my head to get it around the new ideas and sounds.

In the 1970’s it was David Bowie. It was his music but even more the way he projected his sexuality. I came to very much enjoy his 1970’s output, at first grudgingly then to come to respect in the ways he presented himself to the world.

Also in the 1970’s Brian Eno challenged how I listened and viewed music. Whether his rock music or his ambient music he also rearranged my ears to sounds and what he felt constituted music/sounds.

In the 1980’s the New Romantics taught me no matter how popular a style of music could be it could be so wrong headed it could cause irreparable damage to the baseline of rock and roll. Okay, Duran Duran were fairly good (sometimes) but the rest rotted, stinking up an entire generation’s expectations of what rock should (could) sound like. :-) !

This leads me to today’s featured artist -- Ezra Furman.

First off let’s establish right from the beginning that Ezra Furman is a “Wild Child”! He does everything with his life and musical career full blown and “take no prisoners.”

He doesn’t back down. He creates great music and confronts his sexuality right out in public.

Through the years we've been able to see how he's moved through his life by his actions and the make up of his music.

Now, as far as I know/guess, Ezra is transitioning from a man to a woman. He/she has begun identifying as a woman. I have no idea where this is leading in their(heh) life nor do I care in any political or personal sense. They should be happy, and all I really care about is their music, which is wonderful and rocking!

So here's some examples.

This is some thought-provoking stuff, but her music is always challenging and wonderful. It can take real courage to present what you live and believe in to this world, in the 21st century, and especially now, at this perilous moment here in the US of A.

Give it a try!

--- Capt. Al

Holy kazoosis!

Those are some pretty out there wild-and-wacky avant-garde audio/video products, pardner! I gotta confess, I was previously unaware of this Furman critter, and having now watched/listened to those clips I'm not quite sure what I think about them (in both the nominative and gender senses of the word "them." Thank you.).

But good on you for hepping us to Furman! That was a great closer for the series.

Unless, of course, there are going to be more episodes forthcoming. In which case -- let's do lunch. 😎

Monday, February 03, 2025

Wails From the Crypt (An Occasional Series): Special "Great Media Crushes of My Youth" Edition

As you may have heard, the incomparable Marianne Faithfull departed this sad vale of tears on Thursday last at the age of 78.

Needless to say, I was a long-time and huge fan, and when I heard the news, I thought I should post my musings on her breakthrough New Wave album Broken English, from the February 1980 issue of the Magazine Formerly Known as Stereo Review. Which I only barely remembered.

And so here they are.

Mariannae Faithfull (heavy sigh, as Mork from Ork would say) has been my ultimate dream date for about as long as I can remember, as I think she is for a lot of people who went through puberty when I did. Just ask Patti Smith, for example, who wrote a poem about her I can't read without quivering. For those of you too young to remember her, however, let's just say that of all the female icons of London when it was Swinging (rather than Burning), she was by far the most memorable, with a face that could melt your heart and a voice that could turn your limbs to Jello. If you need proof, watch your Public Television outlet for the film version of the Tony Richardson/Nicol Williamson Hamlet, in which she is perhaps the sexiest Ophelia ever to grace a stage. (The relationship with her brother Laertes is, uh, closer than need be). Or better still, rummage up a copy of her 1968 Rolling Stones-backed single of "Sister Morphine," a devastating performance that sounds like it must have been recorded at Season-in-Hell studios; Mick Jagger's more famous version sounds positively idyllic in comparison.

Marianne's been through a lot, in the gossip-column sense, since then, and though she's still gorgeous at thirty-two, life in the fast lane has clearly taken a toll on her voice. Where once she sang like a school girl wise beyond her years, now she comes off as Tallulah Bankhead on methadone. For all that, she's as individual as ever, and if anything, she's a better singing actress than she was in the days when she was fresh out of the convent.

Broken Engish is the result of her hanging out on the fringes of the New Wave scene (her husband, Ben Brierly, who worked on the record, used to be bass player for The Vibrators). Though it's hardly a complete success, and fairly reeks of Catholic guilt, it has a number of interesting moments, including a powerful, if overdressed, version of John Lennon's "Working Class Hero." But what you should buy it for is an astonishing meditation on sexual jealousy called "Why'd Ya do It," in which, while the excellent band wails an atonal, jaggedly metallic mutated reggae, Marianne delivers a dialogue between two angry lovers that is probably the frankest, scariest thing of its kind ever committed to vinyl. You can practically hear her going after the guy's genitals with a meat cleaver. Sure, it's exploitative, and a little too neat a publicity gimmick (let's not forget she made her initial splash by appearing out of wedlock and obviously pregnant on English television), but it's also enormously effective theater. Call me perverse, if you will, but I find myself playing it quite a lot. Ah Marianne -- you can chase after me with a meat cleaver anytime. -- S.S.

Heh. 😎

Seriously -- I think I nailed it pretty good. Plus, it's funny; I'm particularly fond of the "Tallulah Bankhead on methadone" line.