Much More Than A Kim Fowley Production (Never Reissued)

DYAN DIAMOND - IN THE DARK (1978)

 

After Venus & the Razor Blades' breakup in 1977, Diamond went solo and continued to work with Fowley. She recorded her only album, "In the Dark", and it's a perfect example of an LP that was a creative triumph but a commercial disappointment. Produced by Kim Fowley, this little known release showed her to be a spirited new waver with a passion for rockabilly and early rock & roll. The singer really soars on covers of Elvis Costello's "Mystery Dance", Chris Spedding's "Nervous" and Jimmy Reed's "Baby, What you Want Me to Do," but most of the songs were written or co-written by Diamond herself. Though a rockabilly/roots rock approach serves her well on "Animal Girl," "Back on the Strip," and the gutsy "Gonna Rock Ourselves to Death," she's equally captivating on the eerie, menacing title song, and the bluesy "Hot." One of the LP's best cuts is "Your Neighborhood," which finds the L.A. resident reflecting on the political and cultural events of the 1960s. It's worthy to note that Chris Darrow (Kaleidoscope) contributes guitar, slide guitar and more on the album.

 

WU (217 mb)

New York Power Pop Covering Perry Como !!! (Never Reissued)

CHEEPSKATES - SONGS VOL 1 (PERRY COMO) (1992)

 

Right after the release of "It Wings Above", which was their best album (ranked #53 in the Shake Some Action 2.0 book), Shane Faubert decided to record five songs of Perry Como, it might seem an odd idea but listening pleasure is guaranteed.

 

WU (84 mb)

26 Slices Of Vintage Power Pop

VARIOUS - RAIDERS OF THE LOST HOOK Vol. 5 (2020)

 

Of course, plenty of compilations of the genre exist (Yellow Pills Prefill, DIY Rhino, Home Runs, Powerpearls, SSA and more), but it was a challenge for me to make a new volume some 10 years after Volume 4, trying of course to include songs that were not featured on the famous ones. Most of the Power Pop fans will recognize some of the songs as they were part of previous anthologies. But, i really think that Raiders Of The Lost Hook Vol. 5 (1971-1985) is a solid collection of songs from a time full of innocence and fun. A volume of strong melodies, thoughtful lyrics, romantic innocence and rock-candy guitars, here comes the search for the great pop hook.

 

WU (570 mb)

Bomp Records + Kim Fowley = Power Pop (Never Reissued)

VARIOUS - VAMPIRES FROM OUTER SPACE (1979)

 

The artists on this album were all discoveries of Kim Fowley. Released on Bomp records, the album proposed a selection of new or not so new names. The fabulous Tommy Rock and The Lonely Boys were already featured on the Waves compilations, Laurie McAllister was a former Runaways before joining The Orchids with Laurie Bell in 1980, Venus & The Razorblades teamed up along. Surprise has Bart Bishop (a member of The Roulettes who was the brother of Randy Bishop of Wackers' fame) as lead singer. Earle Mankey joins in with both Randy Winburn's songs.

 

WU (241 mb)

Kim Fowley Production (LP Edition)

THE ORCHIDS - THE ORCHIDS (1980)

 

After producing The Runaways. Kim Fowley produced the Dyan Diamond solo album and a few years later he managed and produced another all-girl group "The Orchids" with a former Runaways Laurie McAllister who had replaced Vickie Blue and Laurie Bell who can be heard on the Bomp compilation "Vampires From Outer Space".

The Orchids released only one album which combines the best features of The Runaways (the raunch and sassiness) and Dyan Diamond (the melody and strong vocals) and comes up with what may well be a winning formula. Yes, these girls can rock, pop, sing, play and roll with the right amount of competence, commercialism and subtlety. "Girls" is a strong Cars-ish opener with guitars and vocal arrangement featuring five part harmonies.

 

WU (222 mb)

 

Even though the album is available on some streaming services, i'm sharing the LP edition because the digital stream quality is quite awful, some songs having a 11 khz cutoff, only 4 songs are lossless, and all the other ones are lossy mastered.

Clap Your Hands And Stamp Your Feet

VARIOUS - GLAM & GLITTER (2020)

 

This is my homemade compilation of 25 songs / bands from the last 30 years for some kind of a tribute to the 70's Glam and Glitter era. Some of you will hear some Bolan / Slade / Sweet homages, and they will be right. Only one cover has been included, just because it sounded more Glitter than the Kim Fowley original. And, just for info, no hyper-hairsprayed acts are featured here, only some good old shoutin', stompin' anthems. 100% real Glam guaranteed.

WU (548 mb)

Sharp Dressed Power Pop (Never Reissued)

VARIOUS - SHARP CUTS (New Music From American Bands) (1980)

 

Sharp Cuts features some great music. Ric Ocasek of the Cars produces ex-La Peste Peter Dayton's "Last Supper," as well as the Fast's brilliant "Kids Just Wanna Dance." Both songs are highlights here, but Bates Motel's (they later took the name of Gleaming Spires and became Sparks backing band)'s "Live Among the Dancers" and Single Bullet Theory's "Keep It Tight" get high marks for memorable hooks. Everything on Sharp Cuts is worthwhile, including a rare version of Chris Stamey's "Soul Kiss," performed by the dB's and produced by Alan Betrock; and Gary Valentine & The Know's "I Like Girls" - definite power pop that rocks.

WU (214 mb)

Power Pop From Greg "Stain Boy" Reinel (Never Reissued)

THE NICOTEENS - AMPLITUDE MODULATION EP (1994)

 

Hailing from Florida, fronted by Greg Reinel after the change of name of his previous band "Screaming Iguanas Of Love" to The Nicoteens. This excellent 7" EP offers three slices of pure power pop. Special mention goes to "You're Gonna Save Me" which effortlessly melds a Big Star-ish melody with a Ray Davies -circa '67-feel.
But The Nicoteens were short-lived (this EP plus a song on the Raspberries tribute), Greg Reinel's next project was Nutrajet, a terrific power duo.
Greg is also an amazing designer and his artwork portfolio, includes rock posters, movies/tv, and so much more!. He has worked for Redd Kross, The Vandalias and more famous ones.

 

WU (104 mb)

Chicago Power Pop (Reissue 1996)

OFF BROADWAY USA - ON (1979)

 

Ranked #58 in the first edition of the Power Pop Guide, the album goes to #72 in the 2018 edition.

Fronted by Cliff Johnson, (a founding member of Pezband with Mimi Betinis), Off Broadway USA, from Chicago released their first album in 1979. It was produced by Tom Werman (Cheap Trick) and it's probably one of the best power pop album of the time, with a minor hit "Stay In Time", and the album sold quite well (around 200.000 copies). "Full Moon Turn Your Head Around" was covered by the Methadones in 2006 for their album of covers "21st Century Power Pop Riot".

Off Broadway released a second less successful album in 1980 "Quick Turns" with Mike Gorman (ex-Pezband), afterwards they split and reformed for a comeback album "Fallin' In" in 1997 with Mimi Betinis joining his former Pezband bandmates (Cliff Johnson and Mike Gorman).

 

WU (260 mb)

More Non-Stop Power Pop (Expanded Reissue Japan 2005)

PEZBAND - COVER TO COVER (1979)

 

Third album from the Illinois power pop legends, the 2005 Japanese cd reissue includes their live in London set "Two Old, Two Soon - Live At Dingwalls" ( a 12" released in 1978) as bonus tracks. There are so many strong cuts here "Stella Blue", "Meika", "Didn't We", "Full Power", "Don't Look Back" that the Pezband trilogy stands as one of the best of the golden era of Power Pop.

In 2019, Mimi Betinis and the band remixed the album, "Cover To Cover Remixed". On the new version, the vocals are more prominent and other sonic details are clearer.

 

WU (350 mb)

An Obscure Tribute To The Fab Four (2LP's Edition)

 TRIBUTE TO THE BEATLES - WITHOUT THE BEATLES (1996)

 

Released in 1996 by Joachim A. Reinbold for JARMUSIC, this project was planned some time before the great new Beatles (Anthology) boom. Along with the regular CD edition, the album was also released as a limited edition LP coupled with a 7" bonus (5 songs not available on the cd edition). More differences between both editions can be heard on some songs ("Baby You're a Rich Man" and "Helter Skelter") which were edited for the cd release. A 20-page booklet was inserted with the LP + 2 postcards. The Colin's Hermits (aka XTC) song first appeared on this tribute.

Please read carefully this about the Four Stiltons track if you hear some surface noise recorded ca. 1954, original 7" dusted by Terence a. Burrows (aka the great Yukio Yung);
"Oh Darlin'" was recorded on a ap-308764yy manufactured by the akron petrochemicals. This was pretty much a microphone attached to a colchester bantam lathe. The ap-308764yy was first built in 1946, and was commonly found in american fairgrounds throughout the 1950s. Elvis used a similar model (the ap-30892zz) to make his first recording - a gift for his mother. The acetate of "Oh Darlin'" was doctored using the sonic solutions processing system.

WU (516 mb)

New York Power Pop Covering The Residents !!! (Never Reissued)

CHEEPSKATES - SONGS VOL 2 (THE RESIDENTS) (1992)

 

After covering some songs of Perry Como, the band recorded their final album "Confessional". And then after the breakup, they released a mini album of Residents' songs in 1992. Shane Faubert would begin a solo career (four albums) while Tony Low and Jeremy Lee formed Static 13

WU (54 mb)

The First One on Beserkley (CD Reissue 1987)

EARTH QUAKE - ROCKING THE WORLD (1975)

 

After two albums on A&M Records in the early seventies, "Rocking the World" was a live album and the first to be released on Beserkley Records (home of Jonathan Ricman & The Rubinoos, Tommy Dunbar being the brother of Earth Quake's Robbie Dunbar). Most of the songs are covers (Small Faces, ELO, Easybeats, Bobby Troup, The Velvet Underground). Three studio albums would follow.

 

WU (272 mb)

Boston Power Pop (Never Reissued and Never Will)

 THE ATLANTICS - BIG CITY ROCK (1979)

 

The Atlantics were formed in January 1976 by guitarist Tom Hauck and bass player Bruce Wilkinson, two students at Tufts University in Medford, Massachusetts, just outside Boston. The single “One Last Night” by Bruce Wilkinson received regional and international airplay, and the album garnered a glowing review in Rolling Stone. The original analog tapes of many of the Atlantics most popular songs were then put into storage. In 2006 these tapes were recovered and thirteen tracks were digitally restored for the ATLANTICS album. In 2006, Rayboy Fernandes (Atlantics drummer) posted a comment on the Little Hits blog : "We've been in touch with Universal Music who owns the rights to the master recordings so we could remix and remaster the record correctly because we felt we actually played pretty well. But to no avail. The money it would cost to do this would be impossible to attain"

 

WU (231 mb)

The Vinyl Edition (Not The CD Reissue)

 THE CRETONES - THIN RED LINE (1980)

 

A sadly overlooked skinny-tie power-pop album, "Thin Red Line", was the debut release from The Cretones and was originally released in 1980,Three Mark Goldenberg songs from Thin Red Line were recorded by Linda Ronstadt for her "Mad Love" album, including the title track. The CD reissue (2016) includes three previously unreleased bonus tracks.

 

WU (248 mb)

An Old Forgotten 7" (Never Reissued)

FAMOUS STRANGERS - HARD TIME TO LEAVE YOU (1981)

 

All i can say about this lost and forgotten 7" is that the side A is more than glam-ish, and that the band members were Stephen Gideon Eisner (songwriter, lead guitar & vocals), Bob Proulx (bass & vocals), Brian Hallisey (songwriter, keyboards & vocals) and Jay Rubero (drums). Anyway this is quite enjoyable power pop.

 

WU (52 mb)

The Final Album Before The Split (Never Reissued)

EARTH QUAKE - TWO YEARS IN A PADDED CELL (1979)

 

"Two Years In A Padded Cell" was the fourth and final Earth Quake album released on Beserkley. A "Best Of" (Sittin in the Middle of Madness) of the Beserkley years was released in 2000. But no song from "Two Years In A Padded Cell" was picked. The album might be better than we could have thought over the years, Earth Quake was leaning towards Power Pop, but sadly they split afterwards. There are good songs on this album, and this final release has a great power pop artwork, take a look at the back sleeve, the Rubinoos spirit is not far.

 

WU (240 mb)

File Under Non-Stop Power Pop (Expanded Reissue Japan 2005)

PEZBAND - PEZBAND (1977)

 

Ranked #52 in the first edition of the Power Pop Guide, the album climbs to #47 in the 2018 edition, the album stands up as a classic power pop gem. Of course it flopped and as Mick Rain (drummer) said: "We should have called that record "Too Pop, Too Punk" because that's what the consensus was from  the geniuses running American radio at the time".

 

WU (373 mb)

 

and for the fun of it, here's an unashamed ad for the second Pezband album