Post by bamajohn1 on Apr 20, 2011 20:41:14 GMT -5
About a year ago, I started studying a genre of music that I've always loved that has it's roots squarely in the mid sixties music of the Kinks, Beatles, and the Byrds and loosely includes some of the music of Tom Petty, The Ramones, Blondie, The Sweet, David Bowie, The Cars and on and on! Pete Townshend actually coined the term 'power pop' when refering to the music of fellow mods The Small Faces and I believe the Who's own music!
Power pop typically has strong melody and harmony; few or economical solos; no blues influence; strong guitar crunch and riffs; and often powerful drumming brought to the forefront. There are definitely ballads in the repertoire, but they still tend to have more musical heft than 'sunshine pop'.
Power pop became a vogue term in the 70s to describe pop music with a guitar crunch that was coming into it's own commercially with the music of Badfinger and The Raspberries. Contemporaries Big Star would later gain acclaim as one of the titans of this style of music; but sold very little vinyl in their day! Cheap Trick, Tom Petty, and The Knack took 'power pop' to it's biggest audience in the late 70s!
The Dwight Twilley Band (actually Twilley and Phil Seymour) were a major figure in power pop in the late 70s and played on some Tom Petty records and vice versa. The Shoes, The Records, 20/20, and later the Romantics were other major figures of the genre in that 'second wave' (after Badfinger et al). The Romantics enjoyed some solid commercial success for the genre as a whole in the early 80s with their albums 'Romantics' and 'In Heat'!
Power pop experienced a sort of a backlash in the early 80s as far as the music and look (skinny ties) after the initial smash success of The Knack (My Sharona, Good Girls Don't) because of a perceived arrogance and sexist attitude of the band and a perceived overexposure ( ). The backlash about The Knack's sexism is surprising, since many of the tunes in the power pop genre are nerdy 'boy wishes he could even talk to girl' variety; most notably found in the lush catalogue of The Shoes!
The New Wave, which had much similarity to power pop (including bands like The Cars, Blondie etc), I feel was more exciting and had more substantial songwriting than 'power pop'. I think that was another factor that kept power pop from continuing it's momentum from the 70s into the 80s; it became a subgenre largely below the commercial radar!
Marshall Crenshaw's self titled debut release in 1982 was probably the critical highwater mark for the genre in the 1980s! It was as strong as some of his revered brethren in the New Wave such as Nick Lowe's 'Labour of Lust' and any early Elvis Costello album! A collection of snappy, rockabilly fueled through a new wave filter; it's an absolute classic of any genre.
The Plimsouls were a band that carried the power pop flag on into the 80s; and they also had a rootsiness to their music that sounded like a precursor to the more polished sound of major label era Replacements in the late 80s.
One thing I have noted about power pop is that many of the bands associated with it also have the influence of the countryish harmonies of the Byrds music. Often, what are deemed alt country bands, progress in their music and become more of a power pop band. I think this can be seen in the music of the Old 97's. It can also be seen in the music of Foster and Lloyd who were major country hitmakers in the late 80s with their brand of light cowpunk; and later the solo music of member Bill Lloyd which is more 'power pop'; and Lloyd just happens to be a Kink's follower!
The power pop groups who build their sound around a Byrds influence often mingle a country-ish vocal harmony with jangly guitars; ie Velvet Crush. The jangle alternative pop movement of the 80s that included R.E.M and the dB's also has a toe in the power pop field!
Matthew Sweet and Adam Schmitt rocked power pop into the 1990s with great aplumb! There have been other power pop purveyors such as Superdrag, Fountains of Wayne, and Weezer to carry the torch into the new millenium!
You can get more of a primer on power pop by checking out this wiki link!
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_pop
About a year ago, I set out on a personal quest to create a succession of 'best of' cds of different styles and eras of 'power pop', built from my own collection, my brother Tim's, and new records I could afford to acquire. One of the intents of this exercise was to provide great road trip cds; but I haven't been able to test them in that way!
The first cd I came up with was titled 'Classic Power Pop Vol. 1 - 70s Styled'. The tunes I tried to pick were not all from the 70s but were in the spirit of that classic early 70s period of the genre (ie Raspberries, Big Star, Badfinger).
I will follow with as many videos as possible from my first compilation cd!
I'll start with this Blondie number! Blondie and the New Wave certainly had tunes that fit nicely into the power pop world!
1. Dreaming - Blondie
Power pop typically has strong melody and harmony; few or economical solos; no blues influence; strong guitar crunch and riffs; and often powerful drumming brought to the forefront. There are definitely ballads in the repertoire, but they still tend to have more musical heft than 'sunshine pop'.
Power pop became a vogue term in the 70s to describe pop music with a guitar crunch that was coming into it's own commercially with the music of Badfinger and The Raspberries. Contemporaries Big Star would later gain acclaim as one of the titans of this style of music; but sold very little vinyl in their day! Cheap Trick, Tom Petty, and The Knack took 'power pop' to it's biggest audience in the late 70s!
The Dwight Twilley Band (actually Twilley and Phil Seymour) were a major figure in power pop in the late 70s and played on some Tom Petty records and vice versa. The Shoes, The Records, 20/20, and later the Romantics were other major figures of the genre in that 'second wave' (after Badfinger et al). The Romantics enjoyed some solid commercial success for the genre as a whole in the early 80s with their albums 'Romantics' and 'In Heat'!
Power pop experienced a sort of a backlash in the early 80s as far as the music and look (skinny ties) after the initial smash success of The Knack (My Sharona, Good Girls Don't) because of a perceived arrogance and sexist attitude of the band and a perceived overexposure ( ). The backlash about The Knack's sexism is surprising, since many of the tunes in the power pop genre are nerdy 'boy wishes he could even talk to girl' variety; most notably found in the lush catalogue of The Shoes!
The New Wave, which had much similarity to power pop (including bands like The Cars, Blondie etc), I feel was more exciting and had more substantial songwriting than 'power pop'. I think that was another factor that kept power pop from continuing it's momentum from the 70s into the 80s; it became a subgenre largely below the commercial radar!
Marshall Crenshaw's self titled debut release in 1982 was probably the critical highwater mark for the genre in the 1980s! It was as strong as some of his revered brethren in the New Wave such as Nick Lowe's 'Labour of Lust' and any early Elvis Costello album! A collection of snappy, rockabilly fueled through a new wave filter; it's an absolute classic of any genre.
The Plimsouls were a band that carried the power pop flag on into the 80s; and they also had a rootsiness to their music that sounded like a precursor to the more polished sound of major label era Replacements in the late 80s.
One thing I have noted about power pop is that many of the bands associated with it also have the influence of the countryish harmonies of the Byrds music. Often, what are deemed alt country bands, progress in their music and become more of a power pop band. I think this can be seen in the music of the Old 97's. It can also be seen in the music of Foster and Lloyd who were major country hitmakers in the late 80s with their brand of light cowpunk; and later the solo music of member Bill Lloyd which is more 'power pop'; and Lloyd just happens to be a Kink's follower!
The power pop groups who build their sound around a Byrds influence often mingle a country-ish vocal harmony with jangly guitars; ie Velvet Crush. The jangle alternative pop movement of the 80s that included R.E.M and the dB's also has a toe in the power pop field!
Matthew Sweet and Adam Schmitt rocked power pop into the 1990s with great aplumb! There have been other power pop purveyors such as Superdrag, Fountains of Wayne, and Weezer to carry the torch into the new millenium!
You can get more of a primer on power pop by checking out this wiki link!
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_pop
About a year ago, I set out on a personal quest to create a succession of 'best of' cds of different styles and eras of 'power pop', built from my own collection, my brother Tim's, and new records I could afford to acquire. One of the intents of this exercise was to provide great road trip cds; but I haven't been able to test them in that way!
The first cd I came up with was titled 'Classic Power Pop Vol. 1 - 70s Styled'. The tunes I tried to pick were not all from the 70s but were in the spirit of that classic early 70s period of the genre (ie Raspberries, Big Star, Badfinger).
I will follow with as many videos as possible from my first compilation cd!
I'll start with this Blondie number! Blondie and the New Wave certainly had tunes that fit nicely into the power pop world!
1. Dreaming - Blondie