My goodness, how this event has grown since I first reported James Deem’s popcast in January. The sponsor list is deep now and the concert looks to be a huge success – great job, James. I had the opportunity to listen to the Compilation CD which has tracks from every artist to appear on the show. It’s actually odd hearing the opening track “It Stands to Reason” by James Deem with lyrics, as I’m now used to it being a “theme” for the pop cast radio show. All the tracks here are good and some are exclusive to this set. My favorites are “Obvious” by The Saving Graces, “Brenna, You!” by Frank Royster, and “Pretend” by Crisis. Other noteable tracks are the Pete Ham-like “Candy” by Steve Caraway and Spongetones-like “Tell Me What You See” by Barry Holdship. Other songs range from the aggressive punk pop of The Stellas to the folkie pop of Chad Mackey. Actually nothing too “southern” sounding – although a few tracks like “Let it Go” by U-Phonik have that REM style jangle and others do flirt with the DBs-styled “Chapel Hill” sound, especially power pop favorite Andy Bopp of Myracle Brah. It would’ve been really cool to get P.Hux in this set. “Careless Love” by Lindy Dobbins is the lone female vocal here, so at the next fest I would encourage a few more female artists (not such an easy task with this genre). Like an IPO compilation, you may not like everything here, but the ratio of good tracks are higher than average, and at ten bucks it’s a really good value for 27 tracks of kick ass pop music. Get this collection only at The Charlotte Pop Fest web site, and those who pre-order the CD will also get instant access to a digital download of the entire CD in MP3 format plus bonus tracks by the remaining artists performing at the event that are not on the CD.
Charlotte Pop Fest Website
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