The Gurus Close In

The Gurus - I Don't Care About It mp3

The Gurus - A Walk Again mp3

from fourth, coming (5 Oct.) release,

Closing Circles

on Rainbow Quartz

The pulse quickens in anticipation of any new tuneage from Rainbow Quartz in general and this superb Barcelona powerpop trio in particular. The Gurus were among our earliest posts, and you can still find excellent, viable tuneage from RQ here, here, and here and from The Gurus here. Debra and Fil over at Power Pop Review posted an excellent two-part overview of The Gurus here and here; it's well worth checking out. In deference to PPR's planned posts, we held off posting the following two tunes from The Gurus' third LP, Now, so perhaps enough time has elapsed to excuse our doing so now.

The Gurus - Yer Space Rocket mp3

The Gurus - Second Scene mp3

The Gurus were also among our earliest purchases at eMusic. We bought a bunch and were especially enamored of their cover of The Kinks' "I Need You," which you can sample here. Speaking of which, here's an excellent cover version by superb Boston powerpoppers The Cavedogs we posted back in early days. (That post has three other hot Cavedogs tunes as well.)

The Cavedogs - I Need You mp3

Well, maybe we're starting to ramble, so close we shall.

MySpace | Rainbow Quartz The Gurus Page | iTunes | Amazon mp3 | eMusic

Deep Sea Arcade Bubble Up from Down Under

Deep Sea Arcade - Keep On Walking mp3

"I think our music would be a really good fit with your blog." So said Andy Cassell* of Sydney band Deep Sea Arcade,** and Andy was right. Hopefully you've already listened and will agree with Andy and me. Before we listened, we had a good feeling when Andy told us the band like The Zombies and The Stone Roses. Mmm-hmmm. We're excited to learn DSA plan to release their debut album in 2011. In the meantime, you can get more nice ones by the band here and here.

MySpace

*Director / A & R at Ivy League Records (and formerly of Youth Group)
**Nic Mckenzie, Nick Weaver, Tim Chamberlain, Simon Relf, and Carlos Adura (See various nicknames at their MySpace page.)

I Will Follow (Up) #1: Dutch Elms

Dutch Elms - Cleopatra m4a**

from 2004 release

Music for Happiness

on Jigsaw Records

Update - 11feb16: We just noticed the m4a is no longer available. Here's the Popboomerang widgeted incarnation, though, so you can hear it and buy it cheap.

We'd like to do a couple of followup posts based on posts we posted last week. This is the first one. The second will follow, possibly sometime this year.

We hope you found some nice things to download and buy from the Popboomerang Records compilations we briefly dilated about last week. We certainly did.*** One exciting discovery on Planet of Popboomerang, Vol. 2 was longtime Seattle faves, Dutch Elms. We had posted the marvelous "Cleopatra"**** early in our blog's run and gave it pride of place in our first From the Archives post. Sadly, the original link disappeared. Gladly, inspired by the P-rang comp, we ran a new link to earth at the most excellent Jigsaw Records. (We left "Therefore Talk" there for your listening/downloading pleasure; therefore go there for very much goodness' sake.) You can buy more mp3s at the sites below and read Stewart Mason's interesting review of Music for Happiness here at AllMusic.

MySpace | Jigsaw Records | iTunes | Amazon mp3

**After posting, we find Yahoo Music Player doesn't seem to be able to play the song. You can, however, download it by right-clicking-->Save Target As. Were we not somewhat pacifistpopulists, we would very much like to kick Yahoo Music Player's ass. Update, 10:48 the same day: We bethought us to try YMP on our MacBook, and lo and behold, it worked. So if you want to play the song with YMP, you could go buy a MacBook.

***After more snooping around and around and around and around, we found additional excellent Popboomerang freebies and buyables here and here.

****Okay, look, we really mean it when we say we want to leave you room to decide for yourself whether or not you like a song. But we just have to say that this song thrills us to our core.

Frankie Rose And The Outs - Count Us In!

Frankie Rose And The Outs - Candy mp3

Frankie Rose And The Outs - Little Brown Haired Girls mp3

from their debut album,

Frankie Rose And The Outs

to be outed 21 September (tomorrow) on

Slumberland Records

We loved Brooklynite Frankie Rose's single, Thee Only One, and let you know about it here. Now that she's in with the Outs, we're even more pumped. Thanks to Ma and Pa Slumberland for continuing to shake and wake us with superb ear&eyepoppers! One final note: we're sorry that aesthetic necessity forced us to trim a little bush from the LP pic above. To see the foliage entire, click here.

You may have already clicked on the link to our previous post, but here's the song anyhoo.

Frankie Rose - Thee Only One mp3

MySpace | iTunes | Amazon mp3 | eMusic

Let's Say We Did's Happy Hooker

Update - 15may16:



Let's Say We Did - Straight Back To You mp3

from Straight Back To You EP

released 4 September on

Nesna Records

The demo of this irresistible song came out in 2008 but didn't reach our ears until earlier this year. It was love at first listen, and we sent you straight to it. We're now delighted to find it's been worked up for the Stockholm band's recently released EP and appreciate Nesna's letting us post it until the end of the year. You may have noticed we probably don't emote enough here, but in this case, we can't help but do so. This song wins Hook of the Year hands down. It plays through our minds constantly, even when we aren't hooked up to electronic devices. The staff here at Powerpopulist Central walk around gazyeyed and grinning and singing it to one another. We will now stfu. Except for one more thing: You may have noticed that sometimes in these "blogposts" we like to play around with a band's name. You may have noticed and are bitterly disappointed that this time we didn't, so. . .

MySpace | iTunes

P.S.: We will update this post with more purchase info as soon as we have it.

Music of the Sphere: Olivia TC, La's, Moonhearts, Math&Physics, Girlfriends, Like, Cure, Myelin Sheaths, Fresh & O's, Young, Superguidis, et. al. . .

We get no tireder of saying this than we do of finding all the boffo music at their sites: Thanks, bloghosts!

Olivia Tremor Control - Love Athena - Suffering Jukebox

The La's - Timeless Melody - Barely Awake in Frog Pajamas - Hop to it, and pronto. Something tells me it'll soon be gone.

Math and Physics Club - We're So DIY! - Tullycraft Blog

Girlfriends - Good To Be True - The Ampeter Review

The Like - Fair Game & He's Not A Boy & Release Me - RCRD-LBL - You've probably found these elsewhere; if so, we're happy for ya.

Moonhearts - Shine & Can't Find My Way - Covert Curiosity

Harlem - Be Your Baby - Indierock Cafe
Sex Pistols - Holidays In The Sun - Indierock Cafe - Now there's a juxtaposition of tunes.

The Cure - Boys Don't Cry - AWmusic
The Go! Team - Huddle Formation - AWmusic
Tamaryn - Mild Confusion & Sandstone - AWmusic - We posted their excellent "Love Fade" here, but grab it at AW if you prefer; we won't be hurt.

Picnic - Too Fast - Eardrums - Scroll down to Estonia.
Sometimes Always - Porcelains - Eardrums
One Happy Island - Elegant Elephant - Eardrums
Superguidis - Nao Fosse O Bom Humor - Eardrums - Scroll down to Brazil.

Myelin Sheaths - Everything is Contagious - Raven Sings the Blues
Quest for Fire - Strange Vacation & Set Out Alone - Raven Sings the Blues - highly satisfying psych - yeah, we know, "where's the p-pschtick?"
The Fresh & Onlys - Waterfall - Raven Sings the Blues
The Fresh & Onlys - Troubling Vision - Raven Sings the Blues
The Young - Bird in the Bush - Raven Sings the Blues

The Paparazzi Say "Hi"

The Paparazzi - Hi mp3

from March 2010 release,

Rococo

on Serious Business Records

Cat Power bassist Erik Paparazzi fronts a rockin' outfit his ownself (and has done for seven years). I think it's darned nice that Cat Power is the first of the band's "friends" at MySpace. Many thanks to my li'l pod for reminding me on tonight's nocturnal mission it was time to post this excellent tune.

MySpace | Amazon mp3 | Serious Business Records Page

Popboomerang's Excellent Compilations

Aussie label Popboomerang just let us know they have some excellent free and low-priced downloadable powerpop and janglepop compilations here.

Hmmm, that reminds us of five excellent songs from the 'rang we posted here quite a few moons ago. They're still wonderful and viable and, well, actually, we've just got to go ahead and post two of them again because they ecstaticate us bigtime.

Splurge - Song of Love mp3

Splittsville - Forever mp3

All is Not Lost: The Lovetones, International Jetsetters, the Young Sinclairs, Eternal Summers

Ah, g’day, Joel. You’ve lost your what? Sloooower, mate. No way. Calm down, it’ll turn up, no worries. Of course Matt doesn’t have it. How could you even think such a thing? He doesn’t bloody have it, mkay? When did you last see it? 2006???? And you just now noticed? Crikey.***

The Lovetones - City Meets The Stars mp3

on their fifthcoming LP

Lost

due 28 September on

Planting Seeds Records

We're pstoked these Psydney psychpoppers are about to lay further lovetones on a world that needs them pso very, very much. (Are you tired of this "p" pschtick of ours? If pso, psorry.) We previewed Lost over at Amazon mp3, and needless to psay, were entirely glad to have found it.

We previously posted the first of the following tunes from their fourth LP, 2009's Dimensions, and are glad to have found the psecond at the Planting Seeds psite. (We will not mess with a labelname, nosir/ma'amareee!)

The Lovetones - Journeyman mp3

The Lovetones - Love And Redemption mp3

While over at Planting Seeds, we were delighted to find the following excellent psong by The Lovetones' podmates, Oxfordians International Jetsetters. We posted it before, but why not again?

International Jetsetters - Inside Out mp3 - from Heart Is Black

Also planted were the following two excellent ditties by a personal favorite band, Roanokeans the Young Sinclairs.

the Young Sinclairs - Girl, I'm For Real mp3 - from We Spoke Our Minds EP, as is the following

the Young Sinclairs - You Can Have Her (alternate version) mp3

And while we're at it, while at Pitchfork recently, we came across a goodun by the Young Sinclairs' bassist Daniel Cundiff's band, Eternal Summers, and thought you might like to lend an ear. It's from their upcoming 28 Pseptember release, Silver, on Kanine Records. Many thanks to the 'fork for the headsup.

Eternal Summers - Pogo mp3

MySpace | Bandsite | Amazon mp3 | eMusic

***We're not saying that's Matt in the picture. Not at all.

Bad Books Read Well

Bad Books - You Wouldn't Have to Ask mp3

from forthcoming 19 October release,

Bad Books

on Favorite Gentlemen

We're def looking forward to hearing this ten-song collab between Brooklynite Kevin Devine and Manchester Orchestra, due out on MO's Favorite Gentlemen label. Sure, record and promo companies feed us all kinds of blurbage for their projects, but the song above speaks for itself. I will say, though, that I very much enjoyed one part of the blurb (which you can read almost in entirety here.)

As songwriters go, [MO frontman Andy] Hull and Devine could not be further apart in terms of creative approach. The methodical wordsmith Devine, an English major from Fordham, is known to pine away for great lengths of time just to accurately pin-point one word within a lyric. “I was doing a take of ‘You’re A Mirror I Cannot Avoid’ and stopped myself for fifteen minutes because I was having trouble justifying ending two lines in the same chorus with the word ‘back.’ Just sitting there, staring at the screen, writing different word choices. I asked Andy if he thought it mattered, and he said, ‘Of course it doesn’t.’ Somewhere in that exchange is I think what differentiates us as songwriters. I think Andy trusts his instincts to lead him to the right place in a song, and sometimes I want to outthink my instincts because I’m scared of repeating myself, of resting on my laurels.

Sometimes I kind of feel like Kevin, 'ceptin' I got no laurels. It's okay, though, I'll be fine. Sigh. . . .Well, many thanks to Myles Grosovsky over at Big Hassle for making sure we wouldn't have to ask.

Oh, and one more thing. In case you missed our posting on Manchester Orchestra guitarist Robert McDowell's solo project Gobotron (see pic above), here's the post and here's the song.

Gobotron - Never Turn Around mp3

MySpace | Bandsite

pppurcha$e$ - April-August 2010

If you find yourself liking some of the same music we do, click here to check out four months' worth of our recent purchases over at eMusic. We're particularly excited about Virginia gazers Ceremony, powerpoppers Redd Kross, Fastbacks, Eurovox, Bubblegum Lemonade, and The Yum Yums, the two Ash songs, Aussie psych powerhouse Tame Impala, and a band we found in our last.fm friend kohsuke1978's library, Cherry Blossom Clinic. But again, we're very-much-liking-to-loving all 209 songs.

Tamaryn: Perchance to Dream

Tamaryn - Love Fade mp3

from San Francisco band's forthcoming 14 September full-length debut,

The Wave

on Mexican Summer

Occasionally something perfect and necessary enters one's psyche, like a dream, unbidden. (Freakin' poet here, wot?) Thanks to Joanna at For the Win for making it happen.

MySpace | Amazon mp3 | eMusic

Music of the Sphere: Posies, Silver Sun, Well Wishers, Caddy, Candi, S. Miller, Stooges, Tears, OK Go, Flips, Satin Gum, Them, Byrds, et . al. . . .

Many thanks to the wise, generous, and thoughtful bloggerfolk for making the following earable.

Silver Sun - Lies - Peter's Power Pop - I've bought dozens of songs by these excellent London powerpoppers the last several years; pure.
The Well Wishers - Grammareater - Peter's Power Pop - Likewise have I expended for TWW. See our previous posts of mp3s by this excellent powerpopping San Francisco band here.
Caddy - Electric Hero & Turn Up The Radio - Peter's Power Pop
The Steve Miller Band - Things I Told You - Peter's Power Pop - I love this deep-cut, long-time fave; Peter doesn't. About such things reasonable poppers will disagree.

OK Go - You're So Damn Hot - Indie Rock Cafe
Super Deluxe - Holly's Dream Vacation - Indie Rock Cafe
The Libertines - Don't Look Back Into The Sun - Indie Rock Cafe
Them - Here Comes the Night - Indie Rock Cafe

The Stooges - 1969 - Star Maker Machine - Star Maker gives us the clap.
Stealers Wheel - Stuck In The Middle - Star Maker Machine
The Rembrandts - I'll Be There For You - Star Maker Machine

Candi and the Strangers - MRI - Covert Curiosity
Watch Out For Rockets - Big Lies - Covert Curiosity

Lost Boy - Fast Burn - Altered Zones
Coma Cinema - Come On Apathy - Altered Zones

The Posies - Earlier Than Expected - For The Sake Of The Song

Tears Run Rings - Reunion - mp3hugger

The Byrds - Wasn't Born to Follow - Groover's Paradise

Starry Eyed & Laughing - Going Down & Lady Came from the South - The Rising Storm - Byrdsian

The Flips - I Just Don't Know Where I Stand - Raven Sings the Blues

Division - Regrets - CYSTSFTS

Satin Gum - Hip Shake Heartbreak - Milk Milk Lemonade

Girls in the Eighties - Awake but Not Aware - Gimme Tinnitus

Magnapop Make Me Pop Bigtime

Magnapop - Bring It To Me mp3

Magnapop - Q-Tip mp3

both from 2009 release,

Chase Park

on The Kraft Records

I previously told the exhilarating story of my first listen to these noble Athenians, so shan't repeat it. (You're welcome [to click the link, if you please].) Chase Park snuck under my radar, so I was thrilled to find mention at the excellent blog, Underneathica. (jonder and I might not share identical musical tastes, but his is piquant, and he writes well, unlike. . . Yoo Gno Hoo.) I followed links to the Magnapop bandsite,where I found nine (9) free and legals, including the two (2) above and the one (1) below. I don't know how many glorious times I've listened to the following number, but each and every time I discover new receptors for dopamine gush. Incredible song. Incredible band.

Magnapop - Satellite mp3 - from Mouthfeel

MySpace | AllMusic | Amazon mp3 | eMusic

(We Love The) Natural Extension Concept, and It Doesn't at All Depend on What the Meaning of "Is" Is

The N.E.C. - Those (Guilty Pleasures) mp3

The Atlanta psych outfit's recent LP

Is

on Double Phantom Records.

As you know (or maybe don't, it pstill holds), we're quite willing psuckers for the kind of psuccor this excellent pstuff affords our needy psyches. Many thanks to Jessi at Banter Media for psending it our way. And pspeaking of "way," BTW, we were once planning to write a psong called "(Too Many Psongs) Have Parenthesized Titles" but have now changed our minds.

MySpace | Bandsite | iTunes | Amazon mp3 | eMusic