… if I hadn’t spent the past two four six eight weeks writing that last *@&!ing Scandal post:
I went through a late 70′s power pop phase a month or so back, centered around classic L.A. trio the Nerves. Previously I’d only known them from two cuts on one of Rhino’s D.i.Y. comps
Asobi Seksu‘s Rewolf
Shonen Knife played at the Rickshaw Stop at the end of October, and I made a rare foray out to see them. At this point there’s only one original member left (the drummer looks like she hadn’t been born when the band formed in 1981, though Wikipedia tells me that she was in fact four), but the band still plays with infectious amateur enthusiasm. Their new album, Super Group
Well, that’s it for now. Expect this quasi-hiatus to last pretty much forever.
off of eMusic a couple weeks back, and couldn’t stop listening to it. I’d never previously ventured past Cheap Trick’s 70′s albums before (unless you count a copy of power ballad “The Flame” that I had on 45 when I was 15), since the general consensus seems to be that the quality of the band’s output dipped sharply in the 80′s. There have been a couple of hyped “comeback” records over the years — 1997′s 
comes to mind — but I never checked any of them out, either.
, “O Claire” (think “Oh Caroline”) and “Come On Come On Come On” (versus “Come On, Come On”). Neither song sounds much like its predecessor, though — “O Claire” is Beatlesque pop, and “Come On Come On Come On” is probably the most pummeling song on the album. Pretty much everything is first rate.
version), but these recordings are significantly more aggressive. This works especially on “Big Eyes”, which always came off to me as a goofy novelty on the original LP but rocks here. A few songs, like “Oh Caroline” and “Southern Girls”, sound like they haven’t had all their harmony vocals laid down, and suffer as a result, but other than that, this is a really cool listen.
, a couple weeks ago. I was somewhat underwhelmed the first time I listened to the samples on Amazon — there seemed to be an awful lot of balladry on the album — but the samples grew on me with repeated listens, and I downloaded it tonight. Sounds pretty good so far! Not as good as Rockford, but still quite solid.
, and he’s streaming three tracks off his 
is generally lauded as Sweet’s masterwork, I tend to think it’s a bit overrated. My favorite is actually the quasi-obscure 
from 2003, originally a Japan-only release recorded in a couple days as a “thank you” to the fan base there. The fast writing and recording cycle that the album went through served Sweet well – there was none of the overproduction that marred some of his records. And despite the rushed pace, the songs don’t sound rough or unfinished – in fact, the harmony vocals on “Love Is Gone” are as beautiful as any he’s done. The list of great songs on this record just runs on and on: “The Ocean In-Between”, “I Don’t Want To Know”, “Warning”, “Wait” … it makes you wonder if maybe Sweet shouldn’t always record this way.
