Alot of new music has been flooding my ipod and as I prepare a fresh batch of reviews I wanted to highlight some emerging artists I think power pop fans may like:
The Tacticians
Some nice retro style garagey guitars help make this band sound a bit Tommy Keene-ish. I reccomend listening to “London’s Alight”. Waiting for an album’s worth of material to come out, but so far not a bad start. Visit their site here or listen to them from the myspace page they’ve set up.
Courtney Jaye
Move over Jewel. Here is something really special. A really nice voice – think a mix between Paula Kelly and Sheryl Crow. Playing steady alt. country riffs and sparse drums – she will break out big soon. So far only a EP is for sale. Hear it now and tell your friends, yeah I heard her when she wasn’t a megastar! She also does an awesome Stevie Nicks imitation! Listen on her website or the myspace page
The Lava Province – Strangeway
A solo project from Laurens Vernot. He has an early Marillion pop vibe meets Robert Pollard. The music has a cool hypnotic quality I can’t really describe. This music also reminds me alot of Bob Mould’s poppier stuff – I recommend you listen to “Back here again” and “Let it Go” from his my space page
COMING SOON: Almost here — October 17 is the release of L.E.O.’s new album, “Alpacas Orgling” and the hype is building to stratospheric levels for this. From what I heard as far as samples this is as good as or even better than Roger Manning Jr.’s album. Because power pop greatness doesn’t come very often – check out the pre-order page at Not Lame and give it a listen. You won’t be sorry.
About L.E.O… I got my hot little hands on a copy, and it’s a very cool disc. It came totally hyped to me as “the best powerpop release of the year” (of course, it was the label people saying it), so the bar was set pretty high.
It’s a very interesting concept (lots of digital file transfers and recordings being passed to various contributors from afar).
I have to admit it hasn’t delivered for me, yet. It’s harmonically flawless. But, not as instantly memorable as I was expecting. I keep waiting for it to dig its claws in. But, I’m thinking it’s one of those records that needs to marinate.
Since my blog is very much focused on the Northwest and Seattle in particular, I haven’t written about it. But, good to see others posting on it.
Actually, Courtney Jaye put out an album last year called “Traveling Light,” which was one of my favorites. I put it 10th on my top albums list and wrote:
10. Courtney Jaye, “Traveling Light” — Great voice. She reminds me of Liz Phair vocally, but she’s not quite as musically eccentric. (Actually, she sounds more like Danielle Brisebois to me, but that’s not a lot of help to almost everyone, since so few people have heard her.) Jaye has drawn comparisons with Sheryl Crow, but she’s a little more pop than Crow’s relative rock. Besides, Playboy has picked Jaye as a Woman on the Verge, and Playboy is where you go for music tips, right?
It’s available on amazon and iTunes, if you go that way.