Today’s artists are all grappling with growing up, shifting from their twenties spent aping cool to a thirties confronting responsibility, aging and loss. They’ve glimpsed the fork in the road that spells the end to endless wandering and possibility. It’s time to commit. Luckily these hard and sometimes painful experience translate into plenty of grist for their music mill.
Athens, Georgia everyman Drew Beskin is back with solo album number three, Problematic for the People, the title a cheeky riff on REM’s Automatic for the People. Beskin’s poprock bona fides were established long ago in bands like PURSES, the District Attorneys, and Party Dolls but on this record he lets loose his considerable stylistic chops to produce an album of gorgeous breadth and intensity. I mean, check out the perfect intro roll-out on the opening cut “I’m Not Human,” the languid way it establishes the basic lead guitar hook amid some effortless rhythm guitar flourishes. As the song continues, it delivers a big chorus, the kind that keeps you humming long after the fade out. From there the album shifts moods with ease, from the rocky early 1980s retro of “Going Alright for You” (reviewed previously here) to more stark acoustic numbers like “Culdesac” and “Torn and Blue” to the lush album closer “Atlantic.” There’s some really exquisite stylistic synthesis going on here. Like “Swimming in Bed,” a track that manages to send wonderfully mixed signals with a muted performance while still bursting with an Oasis-like feel and intensity. Personally, I love “Personal Shopping” with its low key seventies pop-disco feel and Beach Boys-doing-Double Fantasy vibe. My take, Problematic for the People is enjoyment guaranteed. Slip the album on your music player and enjoy the ride.
Matthew Milia‘s second solo album Keego Harbor kicks off with “Salad Bars,” a track whose intro piano trickles out like a lost Carpenters tune, only to suddenly lean hard on the country pedal steel. At that point, it kinda sounds like a deep cut from some early America album. From there the pedal steel and country vibe never really go away, but to my ear it owes more to Fountains of Wayne and the Beatles doing country than Nashville. A lot of it has to do with song structure, with songs like “Sunburnt Landscapers” and “Haven’t Heard You Laugh in a Long Time” sounding right out of the Schlesinger/Collingwood songbook. But another factor contributing to this is Milia’s vocals with their hints of Collingwood, sometimes a bit of Elliot Smith, even exuding some Ben Kweller on “With the Taste of Metal on my Tongue.” I will confess a partiality to the few more uptempo numbers on the album, loving the ‘do do do’s carrying “Condo Lakeshore” and Joe Jackson-meets-Apples in Stereo-ish “Autumn America.” In the end, Keego Harbour is more a musical a love letter to a time rather than a place. Still, you can get there just by hitting play.
It’s Hard to be a Person is described as the soundtrack to a book, a very cool idea. Brett Newski is nothing if not barrier breaking. Developed during lockdown, the project has seen Newski confronting his anxiety and depression via a reconnaissance of his past. The project is a new book of drawings and music developed from old notebook sketches and song ideas. Yet the end result looks and sounds as fresh as anything. Fans of Newski will recognize his familiar punk rock Tom Petty vocals while the songs veer toward a caustic acoustic attack not unlike the Violent Femmes (particularly the raucous “Lie in All Honesty” and “Dead to Me”). Things go a bit more poppy on the opening cut “I Should’ve Listened to Ferris Bueller,” which features a guest vocal turn from Steven Page. Despite the album’s consistent vibe, there’s still plenty of variety, with a great shuffle feel on “Lillian Road,” a country/folk swing to “Second String Heart,” while “Life Underwater” alternates between forceful punky verses and a more hooky chorus. But the album’s coup de grace is undoubtedly “Varsity (American Pie),” the obvious single with its steamroller pace, relentless hooks and engaging falsetto vocals (in the chorus). Ultimately Newski’s right, it is definitely hard to be a person. Listening to this record is one way to make it easier.
Old Dog New Tricks is the second LP-length release from Common Grackle, a collaboration between indie pop auteur Gregory Pepper and hip hop producer Factor Chandelier. The results are a decided departure from Pepper’s more typical, madly manic poprock. The ten songs (running just 20 minutes) are low key, often spoken word ruminations on life, loss and growing up. But engaging melodies lurk here too. The McCartney-meets-Satie piano on “Tiny Aphrodite” offers us just such an engaging moment. It’s there with the lead line buried deep in “Bad News.” You can hear it all over “Bud Dwyer” with its muted, discordant Beach Boys vibe. Sometimes the key element of the song is in the changes, like where producer Chandelier changes the aural setting so strikingly it’s almost a hook in itself. The shift in “Mint Chocolate Chip” at the 22 second mark is captivating and a bit additive. Turning to possible singles, the closest thing might be “I Got Scared.” Here I really like the horns and piano and winsome vocals. Bonus: the bandcamp download contains an extra 10 songs and they’re special too (particularly for me, “Please Stop” and “Canadian Raisin”).
Growing up is an exercise in transformation, shedding the old self for something new. Or maybe it’s just a re-arrangement of life’s deck chairs. Either way I reckon there’s insights and enjoyment galore on these here releases.
Feel free to cancel Christmas, my present came early with Gregory Pepper’s new single “I’ve Got a Bottle.” Pepper is Canada’s should-be favourite curio pop songwriter. Master of styles, piquant tunesmith, a clever with words guy, Pepper never fails to deliver the goods. But I have to say, it’s been a while – too long. Pepper took a year to write a song a week during 2017-18 while weathering the loss of his father, arrival of a baby daughter, and driving the occasional snow plow. But now the word has come down that a new album of Pepper tunes – I Know Why You Cry – will drop in the new year. I can’t wait! Seriously, waiting is not my strong point. But in the interim you have this delightful dollop of Pepper pop craftmanship. Enjoy, and get ready for a fab Pepper-stravaganza coming to this station sometime this February.
Christmas music gets a bad wrap (pun intended). Some people seem to think that you can take any old song and throw a seasonal reference in and – voila! – holiday classic. Hardly. Every year an ocean of new Christmas songs hit the holiday beach but few have any staying power. There is something inexplicably magical about the combination of tune, sentiment, and bells that maketh music genuinely seasonal. Kinda like if tinsel and marzipan had a soundtrack. Fortunately, there are a few tunesmiths who still understand how to work the formula, with some of the finest featured here on our now annual holiday music post!
Nine. I don’t why or how I settled on that number but my three previous holiday music posts have all featured nine artists. Weird. Well, I’m not one to needlessly buck tradition so here’s nine more … starting with the amazing Lannie Flowers. Flowers is a longtime veteran of the power pop/indie music scene, charming audiences with his consistently Beatlesque melodic hooks. He returns this year with a remixed version of his 2013 holiday release, “Christmas Without You,” a song that nicely combines jangle with just a hint of country. Next up is a very modern take on seasonal themes, namely, that surely Joseph would have had some doubts about just what was going on with Mary and their miracle baby. Only the New Pornographers could pull off such content and they do on “Joseph, Who Understood,” a new holiday, sing-along classic. Proving their recent comeback Good Times! album was no fluke, the Monkees return this year with a whole album of festive music, with a similar crew of indie pop royalty providing the tunes and musical direction. There’s plenty of good stuff here but “The House of Broken Gingerbread” stands out for me as a superior poprock tune, written by celebrated author Michael Chabon and FOW’s Adam Schlesinger. I’m kinda cheating a bit with this next contribution from Gregory Pepper who just released his holiday-themed four song EP Tsundere. I’m treating his effort like a double-A sided effort, but one with four songs. Pepper’s work sounds deceptively simple but melodically and lyrically he’s a master of so many genre styles and a brilliantly funny and smart lyricist. Spend some time with these tunes. Anybody who can song-check both Macca (“Secret Satan”) and the mopey one (“Home Alone”) knows what he’s doing!
Lannie Flowers – Christmas Without YouThe New Pornographers – Joseph, Who UnderstoodThe Monkees – The House of Broken Gingerbread
Digging a bit deeper into our Christmas music bag, Pugwash prove they are the deserving inheritors of XTC’s brand of hooky, intelligent indie poprock with “Tinsel and Marzipan,” capped with a darling Irish-accented child at the end! Crossing the water to Liverpool Rob Clarke and the Wooltones Mersey up the Christmas music scene with a whole album of festiveness on Bring Me the Wooltones This Year! It’s a very Beatles-ish collection of serious and not so serious contributions, with new songs and old faves. The double-A single for me would be “Another Wooltones Xmas Record/Santa Claus.” It can’t be a Christmas tune-age roundup without a tender ballad of seasonal longing so now we head a bit north to Glasgow to hear from The Pooches and their simple song of needing to be with someone as the yuletide comes, “Christmas, With You.” Both stark and moving. Super poprock stars Fun. haven’t put out much in terms of albums but they did put out a holiday single shortly after their first album. “Believe in Me” bears all the hallmarks of that band’s winning formula: intriguing change ups in the song structure, toy piano solos, and plenty of hooks of course.Pugwash – Tinsel and MarzipanThe Pooches – Christmas (With You)Fun. – Believe in Me
Wrapping up this year’s holiday blog post (literally this time), something more traditional. Well, sort of. Quiet Company love the holidays and we’ve featured their stellar coverage of the traditional canon before. Now they’re back with a timely release that captures the distemper of the times with Baby It’s Cold War Outside. With song titles like “Merry Christmas, The President is Terrible” and “Alone on Christmas (You’re Going to Die)” the sense of seasonal dread really comes through. But the traditional themes of hope are there too with “Little Drummer Boy” and particularly on their original reworking of “Carol of the Bells/Setting the Trap.”
Ah, the telephone. That iconic 20th century technology is all over the rock and roll canon, mostly in its original analog form but with a few recent smartphone additions. Plenty of obvious telephone songs to choose from in terms of hits: The Marvelettes’ “Beechwood-45789,” ELO’s “Telephone Line,” Blondie’s “Call Me,” Tommy Tutone’s “867-5309,” and many, many more. There’s also a slew of less obvious yet popular niche tunes like the Nerves’ “Hanging on the Telephone,” Nick Lowe’s “Switchboard Susan,” and R.E.M.’s “Star 69.” But in this post I wanted to feature some less obvious material, either with songs that focus on key aspects of the phone experience or by lesser known but certainly deserving artists.
“Party Line” appeared on the Kinks’ 1966 album Face to Face and even saw release as a single in Norway (it was the B-side of “Dandy” everywhere else). Leave it to the Kinks to go right for the classed aspect of the modern phone experience, no surprise really given Ray Davies’ lyrical attention to social issues. Nearly everybody from a working class background in the 1950s and 1960s had a party line, a cheaper phone service that you had to share with other households. Like “Dead End Street” and “Picture Book” the song catalogued the not-so-hidden injuries of class in 1960s England, in this case the indignity of the singer’s failed efforts to make a private call. At one point he even mock threatens, “I’m not voting in the next election if they don’t do something about finding out who is on my party line.” One can definitely hear the cross-pollination of Kinks/Beatles reciprocal musical influences on this tune, particularly on the guitar work.
The Records debuted with a pretty great album, 1979’s Shades in Bed, featuring should-be hits like “Starry Eyes” and “Teenarama.” The record also featured “The Phone,” which opened with a classic operator voice-over announcing “I’m sorry, but that number doesn’t answer. Would you please try your number again.” The singer bemoans the phone’s ability to bring food, love and possibly danger but not necessarily connection. In contrast to such serious themes, Rupert Holmes showcases the lighter side of 1970s telephonic tunes on “Answering Machine” from his 1979 album Partners in Crime. In the late 1970s answering machines were just taking off as mass market items and Holmes’ protagonists play an early game of telephone tag with a marriage proposal and response, including the distinctive (and jarring) message-ending beep.
But enough of the past – there are some great recent telephone songs too. Twin Peaks kick up their heels on the rollicking “Telephone” from their 2014 album Wild Onion, a song that sounds so light but recounts love lost via the phone line. Mo Kenney also finds the phone a barrier to communication with her significant other. From Kenny’s 2014 release In My Dreams, the song has some great lines, both lyrical and melodic, and a great 
Now I know what you’re thinking. You’ve seen these sort of crazy K-tel-esque offers before and they just seem too good to be true. Oh, it all starts off nice but after a few weeks of genuinely new material the whole operation degenerates into live album outtakes and crude demo tapes. But hey, would I steer you wrong? As your poprock curator I’ve already sampled the goods and I can assure you everything has an address on quality street. The Song of the Week Club got its start July 4 with the anthemically timely “Going Back to the U.S.A.” Since then he’s produced 14 wholly new poprock gems. By special permission from the head Pepper himself, I can showcase some of this new material here to whet your appetite.
Only 14 songs into his 52 song odyssey and already the wide range of material presents too much choice. But the four songs below I think give you a sense of what Gregory Pepper is doing. The songs capture his musical dexterity, sublime lyrical creativity, and sense of fun. “Sublime Sun Tattoo” has a late 1950s, early 1960s melodrama pop sound, with a lyric devoted to exploring Enya’s possibly castle-fed loneliness. “Worrier Spirit” has very Elvis Costello melodic subtones circa Punch the Clock to my ears. I love the way the guitars charge out of the gate, only to drop out with the vocals, the great pulsing organ, and the theramin/Quinn Martin Productions sound that appears at the three-quarter mark, capped by a cool James Bond chord ending. It’s the little details that make these such melodic masterpieces! “Give Yourself a Hand” has a great swinging feel with sweetened vocals that add just a touch of light to the desperate drabness so typical of a bachelor party trip to the strip joint. “Two Speeds” showcases Pepper’s mastery of different stylistic eras, with some nice Merseybeat touches, particularly the guitar riff and the overall song structure. I gotta stop here or I’ll give away the store.Sublime Sun TattooWorrier SpiritGive Yourself a HandTwo Speeds
Putting a famous name in your song title would seem to be a sure fire way to have a hit. Kim Carnes’ “Bette Davis Eyes” or Weezer’s “Buddy Holly” readily come to mind. But really, those are the exceptions. A quick search of the internet actually turns up a whole bevy of celebrity names on songs, mostly on the indie side of things, most of them album cuts. So why do bands do it? Homage? Satire? Or are they just as celebrity obsessed as everyone else? The French duo Please was formed and recorded a song with the sole explicit intent of getting a response from Paul McCartney – not that Paul appeared to notice! The range of material covered in this post gives us a bit of all these approaches, from hero worship, to ridicule, to little more than just mentioning the celebrity name.
Gregory Pepper is a poprock songwriter and performer extraordinaire. He specializes in writing short, punchy, hook-filled masterpieces on bizarre and/or hilarious topics.
Poprock Record 