Hard to believe we began this list back in early February. Tuff stuff, though, so we do not carp but, rather, thank the superb bloggers who finessed these songs into downloadability.
For some reason some body just followed us on Twitter, and through them we were led to a really fun power pop radio show blasting out of Northwestern University's WNUR in Evanston/Chicago. It's called The Power Pop Shoppe Radio Show, and make no mistake, DJ Gil serves pretty pure platters of the double p.
We were arrested midshow by Chicago bandThe Peeves and found it necessary to track them down and see if they'd cooked up any downloadables. Well, guess what: we found the very one that got us chuffed and cuffed, along with three more name-your-pricers, all available within the widget below .
We have our reasons for using this picture, but we're opting not to reveal them at this time.
Frankly, we don't exactly remember how we discovered these compilations by Sean Bohrman of Burger Records. It probably has something to do with the periodic updates Burger sends us. Ultimately it matters even less than these words we're writing. (Yes, these words, not words like "Sean," "Bohrman," "Burger,," "Records," and "periodic," for those words matter very much indeed.)
Anyway, Sean has put together at least four compilations over at Bandcamp, and we're posting our favorites from three of them. (We opted out of his Tiny Tim comp for the time being.) We encourage you to read his informative, droll comments at Bandcamp, but for now, we're focusing on the music. All the comps are available for name-your-price download.
Ever since Absolute Powerpop first turned us on to PEACHFUZZ back in 2007, the Malibu powerstonerpop flower trio have been one of our very favorite bands. We've bought tons of their songs, repeatedly recommended them to friends, put them in oodles of faves mixes, and happily posted on them back in 2008 when we found some freebies at Last.fm (no longer available).
Imagine our excitement, then, when within the last hour we received word that their just-released-today LP, On Pop Of The World, has been made available for name-your-price download via Peachpoint Productions and Outstanding Unit Records. That's right, you can't, but that's okay because here it is for your listening, downloading pleasure.
For what it's worth, our favorites are #1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, & 8.
At Bandcamp you can also buy PEACHFUZZes on Catch Your Snap, the LP on to which AbPow first turned us. Here's a little sampling of some of our faves.
Here's a few we recently purchased and love from their 2012 LP, Fall Down Dreaming.
And here's another longtime fave, the title cut from their 2003 LP, About a Bird. It's available at Amazon, eMusic, and iTunes.
Doublechecking those links reminded us of a quandary we and some friends encountered years ago when tracking down PEACHFUZZ songs. There is another band called Peachfuzz, from London, Angleland. They're pretty good, too, but definitely not the same band. We'll give you their Bandcamp link so you can distinguish between the two bands and hear and buy whatever you like.
Finally, here's one more particular fave from About a Bird:
The lion has transmogrified into a lamb, i.e., March 2017 is done for, so it's time to take stock. Below is a Playmoss playlist with 19 of our very favorite songs found during the windy month. If you'd like to check out all 50 songs we added during March, click here.
Actually, a couple of numbers we would have added got balky at Playmoss, so we're adding them as videos. And for gins and griggles, we're posting the Forty February Faves playlist we didn't get around to posting at the end of Shortmonth. Hope you enjoy. Oh, not to be presumptuous, but Playmoss has an app (iPhone, Android) you can download to your portable device in case you'd like to listen on the go.
BTW, the March playlist is in order from first of the month to end. The February list is in reverse chronological order. Why? WDK.
Finally, there's no doubt as to what got us most excited last month: the new EP by Oberon/Sydney band Green Buzzard, which we recently posted. Song #11 below ("Dream In/Out") is by them.
We recently came across these songs at Belgian label Belly Button Records but honestly don't remember how we got there. They did rock us, though, and that's the main thing. Not to every popper's taste, but wtf is, wot? Much more is available for name-your-price download via the widgets and at Bandcamp.
Looking over our list of free and legals from SoundCloud we discovered a bunch we like or love but, to our horror, hadn't yet posted. So here they are, beginning with the most recently found (although not necessarily most recently recorded). They cover quite a range of genres and moods, so be prepared. Click the down-arrows to download, except as noted.
And here's a nice little Baroque pop number that's downloadable but, for some reason, unwidgetable (by us anyway). Listen to it below via YouTube if you, like, want to.
The Colors - When Worlds Collide - Go here and then click ". . . More--Download." - from their 2016 LP Teenage Furniture on Nacional Records - As soon as we nail down further info, we'll put it here.
Yeah, we used it before but that's because we like it.
Oberon/Sydney bandGreen Buzzard are one of our very favorite discoveries of the last couple of years, so high as a kite we got to discover their latest release, Space Man Rodeo. (Hear below.) But a few moments ago we sampled every tune and quickly snapped up every one of them at iTunes (all but the excellent "Do You Ever Glow?", which we'd already snapped up as a single). Check out more info by and about GB at FB. We're not big on discouraging words here, so don't let the fact we found the three "Transmissions" to be a bit slowish detract from the fact that on each of the other seven songs on SMR, it's all systems GO!
And if you missed last year's Easy Queezy Squeezy EP, check it out below and buy it at iTunes. We did both and are darned glad we did. While you're at it, check out pretty much all the rest of GreenBuzzard's artistry at their SoundCloud page.
Finally, we push their "Phantasy Girl," video every chance we get because frankly, it's rock perfection, aurally and visually. (In Our Haughty Opinion.)
We got in on Austin favebandCotton Mather's projected 64-song I Ching projectearly on and are excited to find leader Robert Harrison has now completed 30 songs. Following last year's highly praised LP Death of the Cool, CM/RH are set to release followup LP Wild Kingdom next month (7apr17, to be exact).
Below are two freely downloadable songs we love from the new one, plus another we found at Fanatic Promotion's SoundCloud page. In fact numerous Cotton Mather songs are available for free download there. To find out which ones, just hover . . . oh, fudge, here they are: #1, 2, 3, 4, 9, 12, 13, 14, 17, 19, 22. And here are most, if not all, of our Cotton Mather posts.
Many thanks to Fanatic Promotion's Josh Bloomfor that initial alert and all subsequent updates, including this latest.
We've come across a bunch of enjoyable, downloadable cover versions of songs we like or love and thought you might like to have a listen-hear. You will find in the widgets other covers of other bands, dozens of them, in fact. We've posted our favorites, but your kilometrage might vary.
The Kickstand Band cover The Sunrays (1965)
Chris Richards and the Subtractions cover Cheap Trick (twice) & The Who
Bertling Noise Laboratories cover Todd Rundgren, The Romantics, & Elvis Costello
Please join us for the musical portion of today's matutinal ramble. The below randomly shuffled onto our playah as we randomly shuffled down the avenue. The Andy Ketch and Listen Lady tunes are available for name-your-price download at Bandcamp.
'twould appear kiso island are dining at Kiso Island.
A big sloppy merci and happy digestoburp to our Bandcamp buddy lolo of Nimes for the headsup on Vancouver, BC band kiso island. ((We shall wear denim all day (and all of the nighta) in honor, tribute, and gratitude.)) k. i. went three-for-three on this one, and there's more at Bandcamp. Not a lot more, but more. Oh, we've been reading more shtuff about how to be a better blog, so here are ALL the tags the band used at Bandcamp (AND THEY'RE CLICKABLE!):alternativeevil poppnwpower poprocksushiVancouver. Wow, we feel better already.
Once again, Playmoss hasn't included bandnames in some of the songs we've recently widgeted, so here they are. (Don't worry, Mossy, we still love you.)
Mind Meld
We love Mind Meld's self-titled LP so much, we'd like to point you toward the entire album, which you can hear at SoundCloud. (It dropped Thursday, 16feb17.) In addition to the two songs above, we particularly like #s 8, 9, & 10
Yes, yes, do take a bow, as do we for eschewing allusions to snowballs, snow, or balls.
We're grateful to multi(social)media friend Bill Curran for the headsup on these purveyors of high quality pop, L.A. bandSnowball II. More's available at Bandcamp. Here's our favorite so far.
Based on the picture Thibault provides at Still in Rock, the leader of this New Orleans bandis pretty nice looking, but our postitle refers to the jangler below, which Thibault has made available for free download. He's also made another song available for download, along with interesting insights into Freddy Beach's oeuvre to date. We don't know if Google Chrome Translate limns the full measure of what Thibault wants to depict, but we very much enjoyed the concluding sentence of the post: "And then we now have two EPs to put in the tooth for a total of 9 pieces which, I'm sure, will make your neighbor cocaine a little lamb in search of his mom for a nap."
