Tag Archives: Bubblegum

Various Artists: Radio Hits of the 60s

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Terrific collection of AM radio’s highly varied legacy

Rather than picking an artist or label or scene or sound, Legacy’s pulled together thirteen original hit recordings that show the range of music that AM radio brought to its listeners. Collected here is New Orleans R&B (“Ya Ya,” 1961 and “Working in the Coal Mine,” 1966), Dixieland Jazz (“Washington Square,” 1963), Easy Listening (“A Fool Never Learns,” 1964), Folk Pop and Rock (“We’ll Sing in the Sunshine,” 1964 and “In the Year 2525,” 1969), Garage Punk (“Little Girl,” 1966), Soul (“I’m Your Puppet,” 1966 and “Cherry Hill Park,” 1969), Bubblegum (“Simon Says,” 1968), Trad Jazz Vocal (“The Ballad of Bonnie and Clyde,” 1968), and Vocal Pop (“Worst That Could Happen,” 1969).

Even within these individual songs you can often hear more than one genre exerting its influence, such as the steel guitar and horns that provide accents to the superb pop production of Merrilee Rush’s “Angel of the Morning.” In this day of highly balkanized music channels and individually programmed MP3 playlists, it’s hard to imagine such variety inhabiting a single mass-market playlist, but that was part of AM radio’s power to attract and keep a broad swath of listeners. Playing this collection will remind you how good record and radio people were at picking and making hits – the winnowing process disenfranchised many, but what got through the sieves, particularly what got to the top of the charts, was often highly memorable.

Legacy’s disc clocks in at a slim 35 minutes, but what’s here is a terrifically nostalgic spin whose songs stand up to repeated listening forty-plus years later. True, Andy Williams’ “A Fool Never Learns” might wear out its welcome before the other tracks, but it’s part and parcel of the ebb and flow of 1960s AM radio. This set isn’t meant to be an all-inclusive compilation of any one thing in particular, but a reminder of the breadth that once graced individual radio stations across the land. There was a unity to AM radio’s audience that’s been replace by the free choice of the empowered individual. That personalization carries with it many benefits, but the range of this set may remind you of what’s also been lost. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

Studio 99: Perform a Tribute to The Monkees

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Studio99_PerformATributeToTheMonkeesAnemic recreations of Monkees classics

With the original Monkees classics so easily found on CD and digital download, one has to wonder about market for this “tribute” album. Were these novel reinterpretations or gutsy live recordings they might be something worth hearing, but despite the professional production and playing, the results are little more than anemic echoes of the originals. Worse, the band’s lead singer sounds like a wimpy version of Herman’s Hermits’ Peter Noone, so this all ends up sounding like a British Invasion knock-off riding the Monkees coattails. Without the iconic voices of Micky, Davy, and Mike, the studio wizardry of the LA’s finest studio musicians, all that’s left are the songs, which despite their greatness, had their definitive pop recordings 40+ years ago.

Don’t be fooled by the outsized Monkees logo on the front, this is a knock-off in the grand tradition of mass-market cover albums; just about what you’d expect from a group that puts its own name in quote marks. “Studio 99” has dozens of similar albums covering the Beatles, Blondie, Abba, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Santana, Dire Straits and on and on and on and on, all blandly reiterating what’s available in original form from the original artists. If you want to hear the Monkees’ originals, pick up the group’s first four albums (The Monkees, More of the Monkees, Headquarters and Pisces, Capricorn, Aquarius & Jones Ltd.), or Rhino’s anthology Best of the Monkees. If you want to hear some worthwhile Monkees covers, track down Tin Huey or Smash Mouth’s version of “I’m a Believer,” Paul Butterfield’s electric blues “Mary, Mary,” or the Merton Parka’s mod “Steppin’ Stone.” Those are some real tributes. [©2009 hyperbolium dot com]

Deena Shoshkes: Somewhere in Blue

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DeenaShoshkes_SomewhereInBluePlayful DIY pop, bubblegum, girl-group and country sounds

Deena Shoshkes steps out from her work with The Cucumbers to record a solo album that’s more singularly focused on her own singing. Shoshkes has a girlish voice that brings to mind Julie Miller or Rosie Flores, but with a delivery that’s folk-pop rather than country, and music that’s indie bubblegum and girl-group, even as it stretches to twangier melodies and adds harmonica and pedal steel. The album’s catchiest tunes, “Mr. Midnight” and “Gemini Guy,” are bouncy power-pop that bring to mind the DIY sounds of Oh-Ok and Wednesday Week. There are smoky ballads (“Mr. Midnight”), bass-lined funk (“What the Love”), country folk (“That Moon’s Got it Made” “Goodbye Dreamer”), rockabilly (“Best Kind of Something”), and Brazilian rhythm (“You Are the Sweetest Dream”), all given a playful edge from Shoshkes’ voice. [©2009 hyperbolium dot com]

MP3 | Gemini Guy
Deena Shoshkes Home Page
Deena Shoshkes MySpace Page

Sloan: Parallel Play

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sloan_parallelplayCatchy, guitar-heavy pop-rock with 60/70/80s influences

Fifteen years into their recording career, Canada’s Sloan has pulled back from the White Album length, breadth and experimentation of 2006’s Never Hear the End of It to craft this tight set of thirteen guitar rock tunes. While the thirty track sprawl of Never Hear the End of It wasn’t as disjointed as the Beatles’ magnum opus, it offered a similar summing of parts, pulling together threads that had been woven through the bands earlier albums. In contrast, this shorter set is more focused and integrated, including second-side-of-Abbey-Road song-to-song segues that help knit together the multiple songwriter’s works. Though it may not be as intellectually impressive as their previous release, the constricted space amplifies the emotional impact of the band’s energy, pouring terrific pop hooks on top of powerful electric guitars, multipart vocal harmonies, stomping rhythms, and neo-psych production touches.

Beneath the sunshine-pop melodies and textures, the lyrics are surprisingly philosophical, with particular attention paid to the changes wrought by growing up and aging. The two clearest statements, “I’m Not a Kid Anymore” and “Down in the Basement” survey personal and band histories with diametrically opposed viewpoints. The former gazes longingly at a youth free of responsibility and bemoans the singer’s current adult circumstances. The latter, a Dylan-toned electric blues, follows the band’s youth-bound four-track fantasies of stardom into middle-period studio excess, and finally to the surprised and satisfied realization that music actually begat a stable career and family. Elsewhere the lyrics contemplate the need to accept change, the petulant impulse to simply move on, and the complacencies of middle age.

The stories in Sloan’s lyrics are not always as memorable as the words themselves, and neither is as memorable as the harmonies in which they’re sung, the pop-rock with which they’re arranged, or the hooks with which they’re strung together. The range of Sloan’s pop influences, and the fluidity with which they move between them is especially impressive as they, for example, crank up ‘70s styled pub-punk on “Emergency 911,” drop into glam for “Burn For It,” and regress to bouncy bubblegum on “Witch’s Hand.” You can hear elements of many great pop bands here, including the Beatles, Jam, Sweet, Cheap Trick, Oasis, Greenberry Woods, Fountains of Wayne, and others. Sloan doesn’t sound exactly like any one of them, though neither do they have an instantly recognizable sound of their own. [©2009 hyperbolium dot com]

Hear “Witch’s Hand”
Sloan’s Home Page
Sloan’s MySpace Page

Perhapst: Perhapst

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perhapst_perhapstTerrific pop-rock with bubblegum hooks

With the release of this solo album you can now add former Dharma Bum and current Decemberist John Moen to the list of singing drummers, somewhere between Tommy Lee and Country Dick Montana. Moen actually plays just about everything here, supplemented by a few instrumental contributions by Eric Lovre (Dharma Bums) and Stephen Malkmus (Pavement, Jicks). Moen sings in a high sing-song croon that sounds at turns like David Gilmour, Speedy Keene or a more languid version of Ray Davies. His music mixes the hooks of bubblegum and glitter-rock with the vibes of Meddle-era Pink Floyd (ala “San Tropez”), 70s UK acts like Marmalade, Stealers Wheel and Badfinger, and modern revivalists like the Pooh Sticks and Teenage Fanclub. The productions are very tight, as one would expect from a one-man overdubbing band with a drummer at its core. The basic guitar-bass-and-drums are augmented by touches of space-rock, grunge, country, keyboards, autoharp, harmonica and backing vocals. Moen’s lyrics are often difficult to discern from his stylized vocals, and the passages that come through are generally inscrutable. Much like listening to REM, you’ll find yourself compelled to sing along, happily making up mondegreens and frequently having no idea what they mean. The background “na na na’s” speak for themselves, of course. [©2009 hyperbolium dot com]

MP3 | Incense Cone
Perhapst’s MySpace Page

Tommy James and the Shondells: 40 Years–The Complete Singles Collection (1966-2006)

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All the group and solo hits, and more

Tommy James, first with the Shondells and later solo, had a memorable six year run on the singles chart from 1966 through 1971, landing two #1s, sixteen top-40s, and a fistful of top-100s. Disc one encapsulates James’ greatest commercial success, spanning the group’s debut cover of Barry & Greenwich’s “Hanky Panky,” their return to the top of the charts with “Crimson and Clover,” James’ last hit with the Shondells, “She,” and his biggest solo hits, “Draggin’ the Line,” “I’m Comin’ Home.” Filling out the first disc is a wealth of lower-charting singles that includes the galloping pop “Out of the Blue,” the brassy “Somebody Cares,” the funky “Gotta Get Back to You,” the soulful “Come to Me,” the gritty pop-rock “Ball and Chain,” the country-rock “Nothing to Hide,” and the “Horse With No Name” styled “Cat’s Eye in the Window.” James run of hits spanned AM radio’s focus on singles and FM radio’s promotion of longer-form album cuts. The group’s LPs, such as Crimson and Clover, successfully kept a foot in both worlds, selling millions of copies and spinning off multiple hit singles.

What’s most impressive about the variety collected here is that even as James, his writers and his production team took in new influences, they kept a readily identifiable sound and an unwavering bead on the charts. For example, when they added gospel piano, church harmonies and Stax-styled horns to 1970’s “Church Street Soul Revival,” James lead vocal still rings with the youthful quality lent to 1967’s “I Think We’re Alone Now.” James voice fit equally well in the raunchy remake of Goffin & King’s “Hanky Panky” as in the pre-teen bubblegum “It’s Only Love” or flower-power psych of “Crimson and Clover.” The shorthand of a singles anthology might suggest James was a style mercenary or dilettante flitting from trend to trend, but it’s the pull he exerts on his influences that proves otherwise. James wasn’t a chameleon who colored himself with the latest fad; he was a chart artist who adopted new sounds to his own use. It may all be unabashedly commercial, but in retrospect one can hear both craft and art in each and every cut.

In 1970 James split with the Shondells and began writing most of his own material. His solo work found the top-40 again with “Draggin’ the Line” and “I’m Comin’ Home,” as well as more top-100 singles. The latter-third of disc one and the first-half of disc two chronicle James’ most vital period as a solo chart artist. As with his earlier releases, he explored a variety of sounds, including gospel, folk, and soft rock. But unlike his earlier work, the production choices date some of the 1970s sides, intentionally on a heavily processed cover of Gary Glitter’s “I Love You Love me Love,” but more often by absorption of the era’s glistening guitars, echoed drums and artificial keyboards. James reprises his hit song “Tighter and Tighter” (which hit #7 for Alive ‘n Kickin’ in 1970) with a strong ballad vocal outlined in synthesized strings.

James hopped from Roulette to MCA to Fantasy to Millenium where in 1980 he returned to the pop top-40 (after a nine-year absence) with the ballad “Three Times in Love,” topping the adult-contemporary chart in February of that year. Another pair of lower-charting hits followed, “You Got Me” and “You’re So Easy to Love,” and though they’re laced with then-contemporary synthesizers, the melodies are memorable, the guitars have some edge, and James vocals are moving. 1983’s stomping “Say Please” rocks even harder, with a “Louie Louie” guitar riff, a throwback organ solo, and a powerful vocal that ranges from a whisper to a shout. James’ late-80s work is even more influenced by the synthetic sounds of that era than his ‘70s work had been by proto-disco. Where early on he’d used influences to create hits in his own way, he now seemed to be searching for latter-day relevancy, and it didn’t suit him. What finally returned James to radio and the charts were the holiday hit, “I Love Christmas,” and a string of adult contemporary hits sparked by an earthy, gospel cover of his own “Sweet Cherry Wine” and brought to full fruition with the emotional ballad “Love Words.”

Featured among the forty-eight tracks are numerous mono single mixes (1-15, 20, 23-26, 48) and the set closes with James previously unreleased first recording, 1962’s garage rock “Long Pony Tail” by Tom and the Tornadoes. This is an A-sides only collection, so you’ll have to hope for a Bear Family box set if you want all the B’s. Ed Osborne’s liner notes provide background on each stage of James’ career, though it would have been nice to get chart and session info for the individual tracks. The tri-fold digipack features collages of vintage photos from James’ personal collection. Casual fans may prefer a collection that focuses more narrowly on 1966-71 (such as Rhino’s Anthology, or its remastered double-disc replacement The Definitive Pop Collection), but those who want to sample James’ entire arc as a recording artist will appreciate the latter day sides on disc two. [©2008 hyperbolium dot com]

Tommy James’ Home Page

Blue Ash: No More, No Less

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Power-pop classic finally on CD after thirty-five years

At the time of its 1973 release, No More, No Less, received glowing reviews from Rolling Stone, Creem and Bomp, and the band was on their way with opening slots for Aerosmith, Bob Seger and Nazareth, and even Dick Clark gave them a spin on American Bandstand. By the following year, however, a lack of sales led to the dissolution of their contract with Mercury. The band managed one more album in 1979, but essentially disappeared without making a lasting popular mark. Further, unlike fellow cult pop heroes such as the Rubinoos, Blue Ash’s unreissued catalog left their legacy in the hands of a small but influential cadre of fans: Chicago columnist Bob Greene mentioned Blue Ash in an end-of-the-70s best-of column, the Records covered “Abracadabra (Have You Seen Her?),” and Scram’s Lost in the Grooves highlighted the No More, No Less as a lost treasure. While the band’s debut continued to languish in the vault, a 2004 two-CD set Around Again served up demos and outtakes that suggested what we were all missing.

Apparently the haggling over rights and the location of master tapes appears to have been settled, because thirty-five years after its initial release, the original dozen tracks are finally on CD. Best of all, this is a rarity that lives up to its hype, delivering on all the promises of early-70s power pop. Blue Ash, like Big Star, The Raspberries, Badfinger and less commercially successful peers such as the Flamin’ Groovies and Hot Dogs, melded the best of mid-60s harmony with the beefier guitar and drum sounds of the early-70s. They then pressed this combination into the compositionally economic mold that commercial FM borrowed from its AM cousins and used to dethrone its free-form older brothers. The results are effervescent three-minute radio gems that pack musical adventure into a tightly scripted form: guitar solos that sting with energy rather than drag with excess showmanship, Keith Moon-inspired full-kit drumming that serves as a motor rather than an gaudy accessory, melodies that lay their barbed hooks in the first verse, and choruses that lend themselves to immediate sing-a-longs.

As much as the band set out to make pop music that reflected the Beatles, Kinks and Beau Brummels, they did so in a new context. The album’s two covers are instructive: Dylan’s then-unreleased acoustic-and-harmonica travelogue “Dusty Old Fairgrounds” was rearranged into a blazing Who-styled drums-and-guitar rocker, and the Beatles’ “Any Time at All” mimics the original’s gentler verses, but lays down heavier rock for the choruses. That stretching between the sweet pop and rock dynamic characterizes much of the album, as the group employed Byrdsian jangle, Left Banke harmonics and even Brewer & Shipley styled country folk-rock, and then turned around to lay on guitar and rhythm section muscle. The opening “Abracadabra (Have You Seen Her?),” the wishful “All I Want” and the closing “Let There Be Rock” offer the glam-guitar energy of Mott the Hoople and Slade, and though “Smash My Guitar” never attains Who-like ferocity, it still manages to play out its angst with a one-take real-life smashup.

The traditional hard-luck broken hearts of power-pop turn up on “Plain to See,” and the nostalgic tone of the Flamin’ Groovies is heard on “I Remember a Time” and “Wasting My Time.” There are country influences on “Just Another Game,” bubblegum on “Here We Go Again” and West Coast folk rock (with wonderful accents of volume-pedal guitar) on “What Can I Do for You.” It’s easy to tag all these influences and fellow-travelers in retrospect, but in 1973 these sounds were simply part of the atmosphere, rather than icons already ripened for imitation. Blue Ash interpreted their ‘60s influences in the context and conventions of their times. What’s surprising is how undated it still sounds, particularly compared to the radio pop of just a few years later. By sticking to the basics of guitar, bass, drums and a hint of piano, by relying on classic pop melody and craft, Blue Ash minted a timeless classic. [©2008 hyperbolium dot com]

Salt Water Taffy: Finders Keepers

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Bubblegum, breezy vocal pop and misguided A/C ballads

Though this New York based vocal group didn’t conquer the charts, they did release a tasty album on bubblegum ground zero label, Buddah. Originally conceived as a white version of the Fifth Dimension, the group’s repertoire (most of it self-penned) split its time between bubblegum floss and adult contemporary vocal pop. The album’s title song parlays the children’s rhyme “finder’s keepers, loser’s weepers” into a ray of pre-teen sunshine quite similar to hits by the 1910 Fruitgum Company and Ohio Express. Tommy West provides the song’s inviting lead vocal, with the group adds harmonious a backing. The arrangement is pure Brill Building, with baritone sax and full kit drum fills. Though a hit locally in New York, the single didn’t crack the national top-100, even when replayed virtually intact later on the album as “Sticks and Stones.” Anders & Poncia’s storybook-themed “Whence I Make Thee Mine” is arranged as baroque-bubblegum with oboes and harpsichord, and a cover of Mann, Weil & Spector’s “You Baby” (not to be confused with Barri & Sloan’s hit for The Turtles) is rendered cooing and soft. The album’s 1968-styled contemporary tracks feature breezy group vocals backed by guitar, sitar, drums, bass and light horns. Where the energy dips is on solo-sung ballads that have neither the confectionary sweetness of bubblegum nor the jazz inflections of the Fifth Dimension. Though not an essential item for a bubblegum collection, it’s a good second-rounder. [©2008 hyperbolium dot com]

Listen to “Finders Keepers”