Music of the Sphere: Game Theory, Shoes, Resonars, Fountains of Wayne, Boston, Tame Impala, Bass Drum Of Death, Shivvers, F Mac, Fidlar, White Fence, WL, Young Mammals, Al Stewart, Dead Gaze, House of Love, Heavy Times, Cruiser, P. Frampton, Firefall, Orleans, Maxine Nightingale, Starland Vocal Band, Liechtenstein, Men, Oh Sees, Bare Wires

Here's a batch of excelentes we've found at some faveblogs. We thank the hosts.

Game Theory - Lolita Nation demos - Big Plans For Everybody - Fab post on a fab band

Fountains Of Wayne - Denise - Peter's Power Pop

Dead Gaze - I Found the Ending - Austin Town Hall

The House of Love - Shine On - Chromewaves

Bass Drum Of Death - White Fright - Rollo & Grady

Heavy Times - Skull Hair - Gimme Tinnitus

Shoes - Boys Don't Lie - Raven Sings the Blues
The Shivvers - Teen Line - Raven Sings the Blues

Cruiser - Don't Go Alone - AW Music
Tame Impala - Feels Like We Only Go Backwards - AW Music

From Gimme Tinnitus' Massive Best of 2012 Post:
White Fence - Swagger Vets and Double Moon - Gimme Tinnitus
WL - No Escape - Gimme Tinnitus
Fidlar - No Ass - Gimme Tinnitus

From Infrasons' Excellent Souvenirs of 2012 Post:
Resonars - Long Long Thoughts - Infrasons
Bare Wires - Impossible Things - Infrasons
Liechtenstein - Heads on Golden Plate - Infrasons
The Men - Candy - Infrasons
Jim Noir - Driving My Escort Cosworth to the Cake Circus - Infrasons
Thee Oh Sees - Lupine Dominus - Infrasons - Stick with it; it gets better.

Some 70s Faves from a Fun Series at Popdose - Suggestion: Ignore the sometimes inane "insights" of the pundits and decide for yourself. We are glad they liked Boston, though.
Boston - Don't Look Back - Popdose
Firefall - You Are the Woman - Popdose 
Peter Frampton - Show Me the Way - Popdose - Middle digit to the pundits.

Fleetwood Mac - Say You Love Me - Popdose
Fleetwood Mac - Don't Stop - Popdose
Al Stewart - Year of the Cat - Popdose
Al Stewart - Time Passages - Popdose

Maxine Nightingale - Right Back Where We Started From - Popdose
Orleans - Still the One - Popdose 
Starland Vocal Band - Afternoon Delight - Popdose - Another middle digit.

More at Last

Blogger wouldn't let us use more than 200 characters in our labels, hence this second post, as promised. What a bunch of characters Blogger are. And just look at poor Brown Recluse down there, its Play arrow all wumpy-jawed. Sheesh. (Hope you enjoy the music, though.)

Centro-matic - Only In My Double Mind mp3

Milk Maid - Do Right mp3

Reigning Sound - Everything I Do Is Wrong mp3

Brown Recluse - Impressions of a City Morning mp3

One Like Son - Hey Hey mp3

The Pandas - High Birds mp3

Night Beats - Ain't Dumbo mp3

Secret Colours - Follow the Drone mp3

The Vandelles - Dash 'N" Dive mp3 

Bloody Knives - Hands Around My Neck mp3

Woollen Kits - For You mp3

Free at Last, Free at Last . . .

Sometimes it's scary how well li'l ole Last.fm knows our likes and. . .loves. Here is a sampling of what "they've" recommended or made available for free downloading activity. Left click arrows to listen, right click bandnames or song titles to download. We kind of went "Grrrr" when Blogger wouldn't let us include more than 200 characters' worth of labels, so we'll be adding some more Last.fm availables later today or tomorrow.
  
Watch Out For Rockets - ghetto and rye mp3 - Remember this?

Let's Say We Did - Straight Back to You mp3 - We're still adoring this.

Kids on A Crime Spree - Sweet Tooth mp3 - And this.

Winterpills - Broken Arm mp3 - And this.

Phillip Eno - Young Thug mp3

The Search Engines - In Along With You mp3 - We previously posted this one, but we recently enjoyed it in our iPhone and oooh, it's a holiday.

Dropkick - Don't Dream of California mp3

Masonic - Regret Is All mp3

The French Semester - Winter Song mp3

Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin - Think I Wanna Die mp3

Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin - Sink / Let It Sway mp3

Space Wolves (of Buffalo)

When the bandage was removed, he'd lost the 'stache (and a few years) but now had sight in one eye.

 

Sometimes we're really glad you can't discern the lagtime between our finding a band and our finally posting them. We found Space Wolves over at Pop Headwound and immediately loved them but are only now getting around to bloggerly consummation.

We "dug" these lo-fi Upstate New Yawkers so much that we downloaded umpteen of their songs for free over at Bandcamp. (They're catchier than the flu.) Every time one of them has popped in our ears, the pleasure is panged by the nagging thought that we hadn't yet posted them. This has been happening so often of late as to intimate some kind of fateful urging. So today is indeed one of celebration.

We hear tons of disparate influences that plunk our particular twanger, including Buddy Holly, The Connells, Slayer, Morrissey, and the sad-sackism of Green Thoughts-era Smithereens, among possible others. (Just kidding about Slayer.)

We faced a dicey dilemma over how to post these – widgets or last.fm? – so we decided to do both. Bush League? Oh, yeah.

(BTW, (what looks like) all their songs are available at last.fm  (and Bandcamp) (for free downloading activity.))))

We enjoyed this last one so much we wish he'd extended the itinerary.

Food Court: Yummies from Down Under

We're happily tucking into these lo-fi pop tasties from Sydney band, Food Court.  They're definitely whetting our appetite for the EP menued up for April release. You'll find other links and info at their Bandcamp pages.

Gap Dream's Byrdsian Psych Pop Makes Us Feel A Whole Lot Better

It was love at first listen when we heard Cleveland one-man (Gabriel Fulvimar) band Gap Dream's cover of this 1966 Byrdsian B-side by Bristol, CT five-man band The Squires. We sent you to Rollo & Grady to check out "Go Ahead" and have been hugely enjoying it ever since.

You can hear/buy the self-titled LP on which it plays at Bandcamp. (Warning: It's the most visually revolting Bandcamp page we've ever seen. Our gorge rose, our lungs flinched, but, with eyes closed, we listened to fantastic psych pop of very high order.)

There's a fair amount of information available on Gap Dream, but so far we like best what we read at FensePost.

Oh, and that pic up there? We gave you a clue. (Once again, though, there's a bit of gross-out associated therewith, if you actually go to the trouble to track it down.)

Buy the 10-song LP at Bandcamp for $1. Yeah, that's right, one measly buck.

Burger Records Page | Facebook | Suicide Squeeze Records

Goodman's What We Want

It's kind of embarrassing to admit that after getting New Yorker Michael Goodman's informative email the other night, we came to find out we'd already reserved a bunch of songs from his debut LP, What We Want, for purchase at eMusic. Okay, it wasn't that embarrassing: it's always good to know you already liked an artist prior to exposure to the hype machine.

His press release describes his songs as "pop music for nervous young people." It obviously works on nervous codgers as well, and for that we are very grateful. "Night Person," a song we certainly identify with, is available for listening and name-your-price download in the widget below. You can sample the album at Soundcloud, hear and buy all or part of it at Bandcamp, Amazon, and iTunes, and get up close and personal at Facebook.

Let's turn that melancholy, maybe even nervous look in the photo into a smile. After all, we're pretty sure Goodman's music is going to do that to you, as it def did to us.

Ballard: Bloody Catchy Indeed

British multi-instrumentalist Darren Riley has been playing for 25 years now and has finally put out his first EP and LP as Ballard (clicky clicky). We're awfully glad he has done, for his music should highly please devotees of The Beatles, The Kinks, The Who, The Move, Small Faces, and perhaps other of y/our favorites.

Darren writes the songs, sings same, plays all the instruments, produces, and records in what he describes as "your usual one-man bedroom pop group with an ego problem." We're not sure if those last two words mean "big" or "little" because in our back and forthing so far he has been quite a courteous, even self-effacing bloke. He needn't be the latter, for this is primo lo-fi powerpop.

If the tunes we're posting for free download induce similar feelings in you, visit the Ballard Bandcamp pages to hear and purchase more. BTW, Darren kindly gave us permish to host 'n post the Kinksy "Office Warrior," our personal fave on the Little Rockets LP, for which we thank him again. We'll use the widget for now but change modes if necessary.

Gettin' Our Kicks(tand Band)

The Kickstand Band - I Don't Care mp3

We recently pointed you toward a most satisfying number by this Detroit outfit, went and bought six songs from their recently released Puppy Love LP at eMusic, and yesterday found one of the songs we bought available for free download at last.fm. (Maybe you've already listened to it above. It would be difficult, though not impossible, for us to know for sure.)

To top it off, just moments ago we found "Still Thinking Of You Tonight" available for name-your-price download at Bandcamp, in case you, you know, missed it before. (Play/download below or here.) And since the name of one of these songs reminds us of one of our favorite songs from the recently departed year of 2012, we are reposting it as well. In so doing we are probably violating some kind of blogging protocol, but let the identical song titles and Entry #17 in this Cracked Photoplasty thingy convey our regrets.

Honeyslide: Sugar Routine

London band Honeyslide have recently signed with London label Critical Heights and are promising new product this new year. You can download their eponymous EP on a "name your price" basis at Bandcamp and hear more at their Soundcloud page. You can download the delightful, dulcet "Sugar Routine" below or here at a One For the People third-year celebration page at Bandcamp. Sorry the widget's so scrunched. Update: The SoundCloud widgie's gone "poof" so here's the aforementioned Bandcamp one.

Black Tambourine's OneTwoThreeFourFive Ramones Covers

 

I've previously expressed love for Black Tambourine and love their five-song tribute to one of my all-time favorite bands (available at Bandcamp for name-your-price download). It’s fun hearing different vocal interpretations of these classics because let’s face it, Jeff Hyman’s voice (which I loved) was the weak link of the Ramones. Visually he was stunning and his enunciation was appropriately d-u-m-b, but I would wager his voice—and not the violent, dysfunctional lyrics—was the main reason the band never achieved decisive mainstream success.

Now calm down, bratbeaters, headbangers, gluesniffers, pinheads, cretins, animal boys, apepersons, loudmouths, slugs, succubi, commandos, warthogs, psychotherapists, lobotomists, and regular Joeys/Judys/Sheenas/Suzys/Ramonas like myself who just happen to love ‘em and did so from the first second of hearing “Glad to See You Go” in my sister’s living room in the spring of ‘77. (It was a pretty crowded living room.) I also got to see ‘em in Austin on Bastille Day that summer on the Leave Home tour. Standing in that giant buzzsaw (front row of the Armadillo, five feet from Johnny and with a perfect view of the incomparable Erdelyi) was one of the most glorious experiences of my rock and roll life. Maybe I’ll write more about it sometime, although probably not. Come to think about it, I did mention it here and here. I also mentioned seeing them eleven years later in this post about The Buck Pets.