Best Power Pop Songs of All Time?

Elastica - Blue is one of my current obsessions.

Two drunk dudes were walking round the pub singing "Airport" by the Motors the other day.

Brendan Benson's "Tiny Spark" is a nugget-sized wrecking ball. Don't like anything else I've heard by him, but must have played "Tiny Spark" 1000 times in the past 3-4 years. That'd be on my alltime PP comp.

Brendan Benson's "Tiny Spark" is a nugget-sized wrecking ball. Don't like anything else I've heard by him, but must have played "Tiny Spark" 1000 times in the past 3-4 years. That'd be on my alltime PP comp.
--we can only flee in abject horror from yesterday's mistakes (staggerlee)

200 power pop songs in a row is a bit much for me, though.

Heresy!

200 power pop songs in a row is a bit much for me, though.

Heresy!

I picked up the MFSL of Marshall Crenshaw's self titled album and listened to that and Field Day a few times over the last week. Both albums left me kind of cold in the past and still do. "Too polished" are not the right words but something like that -- the guitar fills that are a little too canned, choruses that are a little bland. A band like the Rubinoos made some real clunkers but there's more heart in their music. Maybe it's his voice--I really liked Jaggedland, his 2009 album, where he sounds grizzled and older. That said "Whenever You're on My Mind" is pretty much perfect and "Cynical Girl" gets close.

MFSL is not really worth picking up but the bass is a little more pronounced.

http://open.spotify.com/user/jseraf/playlist/5TRkdCojkl2JpclHE949Mi

In the vein of The Toms:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cg1m0T9hwRI

If you want Power Pop, you have to check out the excellent Elaine MacKenzie album by Green, crammed with yearning & screaming PowerPopSongs. Follow-up White Soul is excellent as well. If I would have to pick one song to include on your comp, it'd be "Don't Ever Fall In Love With Someone, As Long As You Love Someone Else".

― willem (willem), Friday, December 5, 2003 3:56 AM (7 years ago) Bookmark

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DNrWZBzP6_I&feature=related

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ia0uL2vK4dY&feature=related

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MEjutUbgpH8

No Tommy Keene mentioned yet? I'd go with Underworld, but the guy has literally dozens of (should be) classic songs.

"Places That Are Gone" is mixtape gold.

Monroes have amazing hair.

Re: that Mark & the Spies track ... I get what you are saying with the Toms comparison, but IMO that's a lame track, and not alone of late in its old-guy Beatles-ness. I would even put someone like Mike Viola in this category despite his arranging strengths (see this spotify playlist for a lot more http://open.spotify.com/user/roshjosenblum/playlist/62NZXrvkr91d8Ngl0jHfbD ). Too high fidelity? Something that pretty could use some grunge and hiss. Too far removed from the Beatles to know the difference between homage and inspiration? Or maybe it's just songwriting. The chord progressions in the verse and chorus are not only cheesy (forgivable) but boring (not forgivable). The reason hi-fi, poppy tracks by someone like Matthew Sweet tend to work and have replay value is that there is always something at least temporarily ugly and off. e.g. "I've Been Waiting" - there are dissonances everywhere. Of course they eventually resolve, but it's not like it's resonant major chord after chord. "Sick of Myself" is a pretty pat track but the guitar work is good and the lyrics add interest. Those guys should learn from the Toms and do some variations on "Sun" until they learn that dissonance is not necessarily a bad thing.

is this the thread where i mention some of the best power pop songs are probably hard salsa songs

NRBQ - "I Want You Bad", "Ridin' In My Car"
Teenage Fanclub - "Star Sign"
Nazz - "Forget All About It"
Del Amitri - "Roll To Me"
Nils Lofgren & Grin - "White Lies"
Lemonheads - "Into Your Arms"
Hollies - "Look Through Any Window"
The Who - "The Kids Are Alright"
Marshall Crenshaw - "Our Town"

And since virtually all power pop traces its roots back to the first two Byrds albums, I must mention "All I Really Want To Do", "Feel A Whole Lot Better", and "The World Turns All Around Her".

I'd probably go with "You're My Favorite Waste of Time" for Marshall Crenshaw. Amazing that, to my knowledge, he's only recorded that demo-y sounding take on it.

probably something by The Pillows

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JNcy1RHDHhE

• the new pornographers, sing me spanish techno
• elo, don't bring me down
• sweet, fox on the run
• blondie, dreamin'
• exploding hearts, throwaway style

Great song I found on a compilation a few years ago--someone's put it up on YouTube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fT7WNJmqn1Q

I wish she'd open her eyes.

"Ah! Leah!" by Donnie Iris.

Here's a real good one from the 90s. The band is Myracle Brah, the song is called Good Day To The Night. It's not on youtube but you can here a sample below. If you like power pop, it will be worth the 15 seconds.

http://www.pandora.com/myracle-brah/super-automatic/good-day-to-night

Another great one that should have been a hit. The Wake Ups, Nobody Slows. This isn't on youtube either but you can get a feel for it here. So so great.

http://www.amazon.com/Nobody-Slows/dp/B0015ELT3M

Can't find the Wake Ups, but that seems to be a Scruffs cover (or maybe vice versa).

Same band. Their real name is the Wake Ups but for some reason they were called The Scruffs, but not the Memphis power pop Scruffs of the 70s

Interesting...strange that they'd risk comparisons. I'm not that big on their song, but I love "Good Day to the Night." Will have to get hold of the whole album.

teenage fanclub - alcoholiday

This is especially good in the context of the album but one of my '90s favorites - Cotton Mather's Password:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GsE1AM5-KHI

I love "Good Day to the Night." Will have to get hold of the whole album.

The album is called Life On Planet Eartsnop. Well worth searching out.

It occurred to me that this song really belongs on here. A lost classic, in my opinion.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4bDDAOJV1xU

Artful Dodger - most people would say "Wayside" but "Think Think" or "Honor Among Thieves" are even better IMO.
Dwight Twilley - "You Were So Warm"

Modern power pop that I think is really great: Title Tracks from Washington D.C.... The chorus on this one just blows up (ca. 1m 45s)!!:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i1J9AFDstKI

there should be a poll!!

entire Slow Wonder album by ac newman is great, first song:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zO4OY_pKKVc

I know very little about this band except this has been one of my favorite songs for the last two years. I'm pretty sure it belongs in this thread.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDk4INQoIcI

"The Laws Have Changed" by New Pornographers

I downloaded a compilation series a few years ago out of Australia, The Bam Balam Explosion--seven volumes, 22-24 songs each. I burned Vol. 1 last year, and didn't burn anything more; most of it was the kind of power-pop I don't care for (designated by Chuck Eddy as "crunchy" on one of these power-pop threads). Finally got around to burning the second volume, and even though it's more of the same, I like this a lot:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VXjkjFjXDfM

Could almost pass for mid-'60s Who, or at least the vocal could, one of the most Daltrey-like I've ever heard.

Will always be "Tonight" by the Raspberries

Pshaw. The best power pop song:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cbVdrnRm4R4

"Shakin' Street"'s great--was just reading Greil Marcus' review of Back in the USA not 30 minutes ago (just posted yesterday):

http://greilmarcus.net/2014/11/18/mc5-back-in-the-usa-051470/

On the "Nuggets" end of the power pop spectrum, we present: The Grip Weeds - "Astral Man"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pGNjoEfKvbg

One more: "Love's Lost on You"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0utX0_i-ndA

The greatest power-pop album ever in the history of everything has just been reissued on vinyl:
http://www.lionproductions.org/pages/GREENLP.html

How about some Japanese power pop? Puffy AmiYumi - "Planet Tokyo". The whole album "Nice" is worth a listen for anyone into '70s/'80s rock pastiche (all of us). http://open.spotify.com/track/3c8QlMUMpzNjMOZnfoImjx

Having said Radio City is mostly not even remotely power pop, leading to a small chorus of hoots, I feel compelled to say what exactly power pop would be if not that! And yes, September Gurls strikes me as fitting. But songs with a lot of chugging weird rhythmic moves, screwy extra sounds, and audible pain - this describes the bulk of Radio City - don't seem to show up much in the later canon of songs people refer to as power pop.

If power pop means anything other than just a catchy form of "rock" then it should indicate super catchiness, uptempo excitement, a kind of smiling thing going on (that could be messed over by the actual lyrical content: BETTER!), not too many different parts in the same song (i.e. no, seriously, people listing Big Star's far-superior-trippy-bummer-to-roger-waters-era-pink-floyd "Daisy Glaze" as power pop: you wouldn't even call this masterpiece power pop if it were done by any other band).

People start power pop off with Beatles & Kinks & Who & Troggs which is almost cheating! Isn't that just "rock"? Nevertheless, "So Sad About Us" & "With a Girl Like You" do cross over into that super-catchy but still rocking-zone which I'm figuring is the hallmark. personally, I'd say some serious 60s/early 70s power pop examples are:

Beach Boys - Darlin
Grass Roots - Temptation Eyes
Boyce & Hart - I wonder what she's doing tonight
Bobby Fuller Four - I Fought the Law & The Law Won
Nazz - Open My Eyes (this one allegedly an example of 60s punk via nuggets inclusion)
Crabby Appleton - Go Back
Badfinger - No Matter What (if this ain't power pop the genre doesn't exist)

An obvious question --- well, obvious as soon as I ask it --- is the relationship between power pop and bubblegum. I'd say you can't stick a pubic hair between them in some cases: Yummy Yummy by the Ohio Express isn't just pop, and it isn't just powerful, it's the most obvious template for "Holidays in the Sun"

Another obvious question --- why isn't any black music called power pop? (was everything Christgau said about Trouser Press true?) If there is any black power pop then let me nominate "Apple Peaches Pumpkin Pie" by Jay & The Techniques (any excuse to praise that record!!) and "Fun" by Sly & The Family Stone (road-tested with a battalion of power pop fans who loved it). Just for starters, mind you.

There's plenty more lame genre arguments I can troll here but let me get into safer territory now: some examples of great power pop from the 'recognized power pop era' that I shouldn't get many arguments about, at least if you go and listen to them:

Sniff'n the Tears - Driver's Seat
Undertones - Hypnotized
Undertones - His Good Looking Girlfriend (2 undertones songs out of many candidates)
Buzzcocks - Everybody's Happy Nowadays
Monochrome Set - Martians Go Home
Altered Images - Funny Funny Me
The Adverts - Safety in Numbers (allegedly punk I know but Adverts is pretty pop & good for them)
The Vibrators - Baby Baby (ditto)
Shonen Knife - Bear Up Bison (Pretty Little Baka Guy version is more pop & less punk)

This is the best power pop song of all time:

DWIGHT TWILLEY - LOOKING FOR DA MAGICZ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1xq0ykm_SrM

And this the second best:

CIRRUS EDDY - GET DA MSG

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z-Dtg295wVk

This is a storming piece of power pop imo, but might have flown under lots of people's radars through being on a metal album (warning: most pop thing on the record, which is 'only' a great sludge album elsewhere).

http://youtu.be/s7uokNi7qEw

The entire Adam Schmitt - World So Bright album is amazing. His second record is worth checking out too although it's a little darker/more disjointed.

weird why did it take me so long to hear about Emitt Rhodes?

reminds me a lot of the s/t Flame album