Tags
Bleachers, Buddy Holly, Marshall Crenshaw, power pop, The Beatles, The Smithereens, the Steve Miller Band
On the blogosphere there is already a clearly demarked niche music genre that combines melodic pop melodies with the classic rock and roll combo of electric guitars, bass and drums: power pop. Said to have been coined by no less an authority than Pete Townsend of The Who, the term ‘power pop’ is now applied to any band with jangly guitars, swooping background harmonies, and a strong melodic hook. My blogroll features two such sites (Absolute Powerpop and Powerpopaholic) and there are many more. So why cast my efforts under a different label like poprock? Well, simply put, I think poprock is a broader, more inclusive term. Or, to put it another way, while all of power pop could be considered a form of poprock, not all poprock would be characterized as power pop.
For many bloggers, power pop has become a kind of music esthetic: a certain kind of guitar sound, a particular combination of instruments and vocals, etc. Poprock, by contrast, is less rigid. It is less a genre than a sensibility, crossing over different styles. Sure it is defined by strong melodies and as a category it would make little sense if it didn’t relate to the rock and roll cannon. But rock and roll itself was a bastard child of multiple influences: south Chicago electric blues, Appalachian mountain fiddle solos and harmony vocals, western swing, and so on. What differentiates its many sub-genres is the balance of influences. Thus poprock takes a bit more of the swing and country than the blues while still set within the classic rock and roll combo. Here I’m thinking of Buddy Holly, the Beatles, the Steve Miller band (in the hits era), Marshall Crenshaw, The Smithereens, and, more recently, Bleachers.
So don’t get me wrong – I love power pop. It’s just that I like a lot of other things too.Bleachers website
I discovered Good Old War via the single “Broken Record,” released in advance of their most recent album Broken Into Better Shape. I loved it! It had a zany, somewhat frantic arrangement and a host of great melodic hooks, punctuated by background vocals right out of a Schoolhouse Rocks segment. Additionally, as someone often accused of being a ‘broken record,’ it was fun to revisit a term that has become increasingly anachronistic with the eclipse of vinyl. But the song left me wondering if the band might be little more than a novelty act. A perusal of their back catalogue suggested not.
Come of Age is a bit more stark, addressing Britain’s economic and social malaise in “No Hope,” “Weirdo,” “All in Vain,” and “Lonely World.” The album draws creatively from 1950s sources, particularly on the vocals for songs like “Lonely World” and “Teenage Icon”. In 2013 they released an EP, Melody Calling, marking a departure into a more dreamy pop style on the title track. This year’s English Graffiti takes all these previous elements but combines them into a more solid, confident sound, ranging from dreamy pop (“Denial”), to solid singalong fun (“Handsome”), to up front guitar riffing (“20/20”).
I wanted to kick off this blog with a song that would capture the fun, joy, and exhilaration of poprock music. This recent song from Family of the Year does the job. In my alternate universe poprock world this song would be a giant hit, blaring out of AM radios across the continent. Family of the Year have made much pleasant pop music on previous releases, gaining some attention for their contribution to the Boyhood soundtrack (“Hero”) and with the lush Beach Boys-esque “Summer Girl” from their first release. But nothing that takes off quite like “Make You Mine”. The song kicks off with a simple piano riff, which is immediately echoed by the rhythm guitar, drawing you in with a classic poprock hook. The lyrics pay tribute to summer love, even if they are somewhat ambiguous about the singer’s intentions. For instance, when he says “All the boys and all the pretty girls, summer time I’m going to make you mine” is he suggesting he’s just not that fussy about which gender he ends up with? Such a sentiment would not be out of sync with today’s youth. The best of poprock makes you feel good and this song definitely delivers on that promise.Make You Mine
Poprock Record 