That Summer Feeling With The Sound Of Pop Art
June 29th, 2010
Hey now that summer is here, we also have the perfect soundtrack for summer with The Sound Of Pop Art (www.myspace.com/popartsongs) and their debut self titled longplayer on the newly founded England In June label. Pop Art (as they started out as) is a band that I have been very excited about and have been following since their very early days when I heard their initial demos, and knew that they were going to create a masterpiece of a record. They were so amazing, that I even reviewed some of the songs here - http://thebeautifulmusic.com/blog/?p=757 – and provided some hints at the legendary history of two of the main characters behind the band Chris Free and Tony Jenkins, which goes back as far as the punk days when Chris was with The Users and the second coming of Mod with A Craze and labels such as Paul Weller’s Respond Records and Tony’s band Plume and his record label Everlasting Records. With a history like that it is not surprising that The Sound Of Pop Art has created a majestic collection of Superb Songs that will satisfy any discerning music fan.
“12 Classic Songs For Beat Bohemian Music Lovers” and “Beatnik Pop / Accoustic Soul” is how the album describes itself and that is a perfect description. I will attempt to provide you my observations on these tracks as follows:
“Custom Built” starts things off with a swaying epic, a wonderful update of The Ronnettes style in a “Be My Baby” heavenly vocal style, with a real beat flair especially when Tony sings “Oh Yeah”, kind of like The Revillos singing the Beatles.
“That Summer Feeling” kicks in sounding like Makin Time meets The Style Council and colliding with The Beautiful South to create a groove with a whole lot of Soul – something to live for.
Track 3, “Visions Of You” slows things down, sounding like a folky Roddy Frame (Aztec Camera) fronting the Fantastic Something, with gentle guitars serenading you drift into a daydream.
For anyone who hates Shopping, then “Shopping Centre Saturday Afternoon” will become your new anthem as he sings ‘Shopping Centres, they mess up your mind’, yes let’s run away as we listen to this song which conjures up the sound of Paul Bevoir and The Jetset and maybe hints of The Cherry Orchard.
Song 5 starts off mellow but has the undercurrents of a spy thriller theme as the song builds in a Stereophonic Space Sound feel, only to slow things down again, keeping you in suspence.
“High Street Girl”, brings us some swinging sixties feel with guitars from the early Who sound and hints of The Jetset, and dreamy psych pop flourishes.
The soulful blues stomp of “Damage Limitation & The Junk Yard Blues” also conjures up a ‘My Generation’ Who, with traces of The Jam and maybe even The Inmates.
“Run Away Baby” is an early favourite of mine, and this version is a beautiful ballad a la Burt Bacharach with plenty of class as sung by The Zombies, The Direct Hits or The Left Banke.
“A Love Out Of Bounds” is more swinging sounds for the Beat Bohemian music lover with a jazzy feel, not far from The Wondermints meet The Sneetches territory.
Track 10, “Until Forever” is a real gem which drifts along quietly, sounding like a young Paul Weller or a Colin Swan doing an exceptional folky ballad taking you through ‘pastures new’. This is a quiet song that you will want to play load and let yourself float through time.
Another dreamy masterpiece is “Shooting Star” that takes you ‘high above the clouds’ and has traces of Bowie and Pink Floyd and the French chanteuse.
Not sure how to describe the closing track which ends things off in more bluesy style, bringing to close an exceptional album. “These are the things that mod/pop dreams are made of!”
And as Jonathan Richman once sang (and BMX Bandits covered) “That Summer Feeling Is Going To Haunt You The Rest Of Your Life”, well this album will haunt you, in a good way the rest of your life as this is timeless POP for the NOW generation.
Categories: 2010 Favourite, Great Music | Tags: A Craze, Aztec Camera, Everlasting Records, Paul Weller, Plume, Respond Records, The Direct Hits, The Sneetches, The Sound Of Pop Art, The Users, The Wondermints | No Comments
