David Mead -- "Sweet Sunshine"/"Telephone" (1999)

After reading a rave review online on some power pop site, I bought David Mead's RCA Records debut The Luxury of Time without having heard a note of it in advance. Remember those compulsive times?

I'm not quite sure I'd classify Mead as "power pop," although I'm sure there are those who could stretch him under that umbrella.

Mead is a classic pop/rock singer-songwriter craftsman with an amazing voice, how's that?

So you know there's no way this guy is going to last on a major label the way that music is marketed and produced, too. Unless he was going to sell at least a couple of hundred thousand albums, RCA would set him free.

Too bad, because this record is like a lost gem of great music, the kind of individual statement that very few songwriters can make on a major label. Lyrically, Mead is akin to Paul Simon, concocting personal pictures about the inability to move on in life ("Landlocked"), the collapse of 60's idealism ("Robert Bradley's Postcard"), and taking yourself too seriously ("World of A King"). Musically, the influences are definitely Simon & Garfunkel, The Beatles and The Smiths.

What's remarkable about the first album is the production by Peter Collins, an Englishman who did the same duties for Canadian power trio Rush, Queenryche, Bon Jovi, Alice Cooper, Musical Youth ("Pass The Dutchie!"), Nik Kershaw and Tracey Ullman ("They Don't Know"). You wouldn't exactly think Collins and Mead would be a match, but they click in an unexpected way. Instead of making Mead's sonic palette all singer/songwriter-y with sparse arrangements, Collins lays it on thick with electric and acoustic guitars, reverbs, and delays in a full rock production.

You can just tell that the production is English and not American. I think an American producer would have used Bridge Over Troubled Water or an early Simon album as a reference. Collins went the route of 80's English rock, as the drums are big, the guitars are layered, delayed and EQ'd perfectly, and it all crunches when it has to with a distinct analog warmth.

My two favorite songs on The Luxury of Time are "Sweet Sunshine" and "Telephone." Besides being absurdly hook-happy, they are marvels of a musical artist hitting on all cylinders. Mead's vocals naturally swoop, even within verses and choruses. "Sweet Sunshine" is like walking down the street on the sunniest day of the year and you can feel this guy's head soaring. The opening of "Telephone" is right out of the manic offbeat drum pattern of The Beatles' "Tomorrow Never Knows" and then straightens out to 4/4 for the choruses.

Mead's second RCA album, Mine and Yours, was produced by Fountain of Wayne's Adam Schlesinger, and with its lack of blockbuster sales, was the ticket out the door. What followed were much more intimate albums on indie labels, each one a remarkable showcase for his talents, and two of them produced by everybody's favorite Nashville-based power pop producer, Brad Jones (see Josh Rouse's "Winter In The Hamptons").

Below are some video treats. First, since RCA didn't spring for the videos themselves, I made one for both "Sweet Sunshine" and "Telephone" so you can hear these great songs with Collins' deep production. Then Mead performing each of these songs solo on acoustic guitar from a gig in Philadelphia, and finally, from Chicago in fall 2009, he does Paul Simon's "Only Living Boy in New York" (a cover which he did on the soundtrack to the TV show "Everwood," released in 2002).

Taxiride -- "Everywhere You Go" (1999)

Another shot in the dark after reading about them on power pop web-based publications like fufkin.com. I liked what I heard streaming over Not Lame's web site, so I bought it on Amazon.

Now I know you're saying -- who are these guys? This was a major label album, on Warner Brothers, that received zero promotion or push, and disappeared faster than a sinking stone.

Debuting smack in the middle of boy band fever, Taxiride looks like they were packaged the same way because, hey, four guys singing, just like The Backstreet Boys! However, the only things they had in common were the same gene set.

Taxiride was signed out of Melbourne, Australia, and it was probably Warners' hope that four good looking guys could ride that N' Sync fad. Just a listen to the very first song from the debut album Imaginate, and you knew this was not some manufactured pseudo hip-hop or heavy ballad silliness. Warners recruited master mixer and producer Jack Joseph Puig to put the polish on these boys. "Can You Feel" was all acoustic guitars and four part harmonies, like a modernized Crosby, Still & Nash, with no drums, bass or keyboards, and rather enveloping to the ears.

The killer song was "Everywhere You Go," which is really the perfect pop rock song, blending acoustic and electric guitars, all those great vocals, production ear candy courtesy of Puig, and the full band playing. And unlike boy bands, who had the Swedish pop machines creating all their material, Taxiride wrote all of their own material.

In learning how to mix over the years, the mantra you hear over and over again is "make it exciting," and this song is definitely a Puig masterclass. If you've heard similar Goo Goo Dolls tune "Slide," which Puig also did the honors, the instruments and vocals have their own space, each one EQ'd precisely in the sound field, everything just builds up from a simple guitar strum, smooths out in the break, subtle use of delays during the second chorus, and little counter reactions to the beat that take over your mind and you don't even realize it.

I played "Everywhere You Go" for my daughter in my car a few years ago, and she made me repeat it a few times immediately, then requested I burn it for her on a CD. That's how addicting a great all around pop rock song can be.

Taxiride's success may have been contained strictly in Australia, and Imaginate relegated immediately to the cut-out bins, they've left us this hidden musical gem.

Strangely enough, the song's official video has a "rougher mix," which seems to have pushed the acoustic guitars back or out altogether, and put the "telephone EQ" effect for the intro. So you should definitely listen to the original version here and then check out the video version below.

Richard X. Heyman -- "Falling Away" (1991)

Richard X. Heyman's Hey Man was one of those CD's that I hung on to through moves, marriage, and kids because years ago, Warner Brothers sent it to me and I loved the first song, "Falling Away." If you're a pack rat like me, you end up storing away discs because there was something about it you really liked, but then they ended up getting buried along with all the other stuff you were hoarding.

In my rediscovery of modern power pop in the late 90's, I found Richard X. Heyman's one major label album brought up as a constant favorite. Just in time too, as Heyman released his Cornerstone album in 1998, his first since 1991's Hey Man.

A multi-instrumentalist whose primary chops are on the drums, Heyman was the rare power popper to emerge from the East Village of Manhattan. While that downtown scene was far better known for punk and more artsier aspirations (although you could argue The Ramones had some definite power pop in them), Heyman was a sponge of Byrds, British Invasion, Beatles, and 60's chamber pop and garage rock.

A combination of being on Warner Brothers' alt rock/new wave Sire label and the impression of this tall, lanky long-haired dude on the cover led me to believe I was in for something crushing and punky, perhaps arty in the vein of Tom Verlaine or Richard Lloyd. Yet, as the single always leads off the album, I could not have been more wrong. "Falling Away" is a sparkling 3-minute power pop blueprint, with a little bit of 60's go-go thrown in (as the promo video obviously captured), all hooks and harmonies, a main lick that sounds like a tribute to the Byrds' "Eight Miles High" and the overdubbed harmonies of the man himself in all his nasal glory. It's a song that you can't help feeling great when you hear it because Heyman is a rock romanticist

Living that sort of rock and roll fairytale, Heyman married bassist Nancy Leigh, who toured and played on many notable band albums in punk and new wave's heyday (including my friend Binky Phillips' indie album in the early 80's).

Heyman audaciously self-published his memoirs, Boom Harangue, as a paperback in 2001, and on a whim I purchased it. Messy but evocative of the times, Heyman wrote about growing up a child of the 60's in a Plainfield, NJ Jewish family, taking up the drums at a young age, following local TV shows and bands, early teen band signings and various touring gigs and finally getting Hey Man out on a major label, only to see it wither from no support. Let's face it, not a great time to put out a power pop album when Nirvana, Pearl Jam and Alice in Chains were monopolizing all the radio play and album sales.

Since Hey Man, Heyman puts out more fine power pop albums on his own Turn-Up Records label, sometimes on CD and now download only. He used to play living room concerts for people who contacted him on his web site, but it seems like that's history. His wife Nancy manages all his business and performs with him. Heyman reunited with his early New Jersey band The Doughboys and just released their second album of rough and tumble sneering garage rock, cater made for Little Steven's Underground Garage channel on Sirius/XM satellite radio.

The official video for "Falling Away" is a Rickenbacker lover's wet dream, with Heyman changing gorgeous models between edits. And yes, that's wife Nancy on the bass.

The Mop Tops -- "Plastic Moon Rain" (1995)

This is the band that made me want to go out and buy Rickenbacker guitars (and I ended up with two).

In the aforementioned post from a couple of days ago, describing my discovery of modern day power pop and purchase of Not Lame's The World's Greatest Power Pop Compilation... Really, the very first cut on that album was this song, The Mop Top's "Plastic Moon Rain."

Folks, I was truly forever sold when the first several seconds played. Ringing, slightly overdriven Rickenbacker guitars playing full out D major and A7 chords playing by themselves, with the drums pumping into the beat. Do you remember hearing all those guitars on Byrds songs like "Feel A Whole Lot Better" and "Mr. Tambourine Man" and Tom Petty classics like "Here Comes My Girl" and "The Waiting?" That's how it hit me then and it still sounds great now. And to encapsulate the perfect single, they speed it up at the end and bring in the tambourines, a trick that Todd Rundgren memorialized in the liner notes to his Something/Anything album.

Yes, leave it to the Swedish once more to take a musical genre and perfect it. Those guys have always known their pop, whether it's the sweeping Euro style of ABBA or current production and songwriting behind Britney Spears and Ke$ha ("Tik Tok"), it seems catchy hooks are that country's major export.

What is "Plastic Moon Rain?" I swear I think it's about death in some Frank Zappa kind of way.

Magic world train, plastic moon rain.
I feel no pain, plastic moon rain.
You grow old, no hair to comb.
So alone, in your heart and soul.

Fall on me again, fall on me again
Plastic, moon rain
Let it fall, let it fall, Let it fall on me again
Plastic, moon rain , Don't deny it, here it comes.

Don't be afraid, you're not insane
If you see, the plastic moon rain
There's no escape, no hideaway
Come taste and feel, the plastic moon rain
Fall on me again, fall on me again.
Plastic, moon rain

And who are these Mop Tops, who came up with their corny Beatles tribute name? According to their web site, they've been around since 1985, and their audience liked their "ruffleshirts, Chealseaboots, Vox amplifiers and swaying popbeat (all spelling theirs)." With a back catalog of 200 songs, they signed a deal with Velodrome Records in Gothenburg, and their album Inside was released. Contributing singles on a handful of compilations, the band only produced their second full album in 2008, Ground Floor Man.

Inside is a Beatles-like Rickenbacker showcase, all deeply rooted in the Fab Four's early albums like Meet The Beatles, A Hard Day's Night, Help and Revolver. They don't mimic the Beatles, like the fictional Rutles, but employ the band's styles and instrumental simplicity, a real throwback when artists went for a jangly 60's sound with a quartet of instruments. Unfortunately, Inside is out of print.

But what we do have is this outstanding song. The video takes photos from The Mop Tops' web site, when they played small clubs in a couple of rare New York City visits, visited a well-stocked music store selling (what else) Rickenbackers, and performed at Liverpool's Cavern Club for a Beatles fest.

The Rooks -- "Reasons"/"Colors" (1995)

One of my biggest music turning points took place in 1997 when I was browsing the lower level of the late HMV on East 86th Street in Manhattan. I remember not being terribly impressed by anything on the radio, grunge's heyday had passed, my son was just one year old, so I found myself walking up to 86th Street to do a cultural clean sweep between HMV and Barnes & Noble.

In the compilations section, I ran across three new CD's from the Warner Brothers archival label Rhino devoted to power pop of the 70's, 80's and 90's respectively, the famous (and brave) Poptopia series.

I was familiar with almost all the 70's content (The Raspberries, Dwight Twilley, Badfinger, Nick Lowe, Cheap Trick, Shoes, etc.), about half the the 80's edition and almost none of the 90's. As a matter of fact, I was surprised there was a CD devoted to the 90's at all -- there was power pop going on now? I bought the last two decade editions and brought them home to sample.

Even though I had never heard of most of the 90's bands, it was clear that three-minute jangly guitar rock was alive and well. As is my habit of diving in deeply into my passions, I researched every one of my favorite songs on that CD, typed in "power pop" into a search engine, and among the top results was Colorado-based power pop store/label Not Lame. I had struck gold, because here was a site that was slavishly devoted to the whole genre, selling CD's from all kinds of regional labels, with a special section devoted to Swedish power pop!

I took the safe route by ordering a Not Lame compilation modestly titled The World's Best Power Pop Compilation... Really! Volume One. After the Rhino Poptopia compilation, this was another CD sent from rock heaven, cracking open the that genre even further with more artists to relish and research. Good taste travels because there was one band both CD's shared -- The Rooks.

If the Beatles could release double A-sided singles (i.e. "Paperback Writer"/"Rain" and "Penny Lane"/"Strawberry Fields Forever"), the Rooks could have put out one of their own with "Reasons" (from Poptopia) on one side and "Colors" (from World's Best Power Pop) on the other.

Here was New York City-based band, right in my own backyard, emulating British Invasion guitar bands, an American version of the beloved UK New Wave group The Records, with chiming Rickenbackers and Fenders, layered harmonies, bristling tambourines, and the occasional two-lead attack (see The Records' "Starry Eyes" for reference!). Both "Reasons" and "Colors" are turn-it-up-loud songs that you can sing to, with modern analog production, yet sounding delightfully retro, like when you first heard the jangle of The Hollies' "On A Carousel."

I'll admit that "Reasons" has very few lyrics, and you really have to listen to get all the words of "Colors" through the mix, but it honestly makes no difference. Who could decipher what Michael Stipe was singing about on the first four R.E.M. albums behind the jangly guitars of Peter Buck?

The Rooks, led by songwriter/singer/guitarist Mike Mazzarella, remained local underground favorites throughout the 90's who were loved by the alternative music writers and critics, but sadly never able to break out on any wide basis. They produced indie label albums and singles and found themselves on other compilations, and I don't even know if they are technically still "together."

Their web site at www.therooks.com is alive and well with a tremendous amount of content and scrapbooks. In his online bio, Mazzarrella writes: "Today, most songs are written around riffs, samples and patterns and that is where the classic song structure suffers. If I can't perform a song on an acoustic guitar or piano and make it work, then it's not worth my time."

I have the best of the Rooks in one good place, their Not Lame compilation called Encore Echoes, which contains "Reasons," "Colors" and a whole lot more of their great songs if you appreciate British Invasion-influenced guitar bands.

Since there are no videos for "Reasons" and "Colors," I've created one of my own featuring both songs, incorporating much of the artwork from The Rooks' web site. Below that is a fun 3 1/2 minute overview from a never completed 1998 documentary about the band, featuring the backing tracks of another song, "Love Said To Me."

Fountains of Wayne -- "Radiation Vibe" (1996)

Smart ass rock grew like weeds in the mid-90's. These are bands that were the equivalent of the smart kids you went to high school with who seemed to pick up on every cool cultural reference and then use it as a sarcastic weapon to make fun of the jocks and punks behind their backs.

That's when Weezer, Ween, The Presidents of the United States, Nada Surf, and their brethren came out of the woodwork, almost as a reaction to the loud, unruly grunge craze that preceded it.

If you look back, some of these bands are still around and kicking, quite successfully too, although not on a massive breakthrough basis. They inspire feverish cults and once in a while, throw off an actual top 40 single, like Weezer's "Beverly Hills" and Fountains of Wayne's "Stacy's Mom."

So when Fountains of Wayne broke out of the gate with "Radiation Vibe," they could have been any one of the other really good smart ass bands. I bought the debut album it came from as a used copy, and frankly, I'm a nut for good power pop so there was no way this could lose.

My description of "Radiation Vibe" to my friends was "the Cars meet The Ramones." This first record was little rawer than the ones that followed, but the super-hook songwriting was already in place. Later on, FOW polished up their act and blatantly milked their love of the Cars for "Stacy's Mom," right down to the rigid 4/4 beat and hand claps.

Even to this day, "Radiation Vibe" makes no sense at all, thumping along with its fuzzy envelopey guitar chords, but when the electric guitars and drums landslide in for the pre-chorus ("And now it's time to say/What I forgot to say") and then the 60's-modeled chorus, you've got to sing along to the stupid words. Songwriters Adam Schlesinger and Chris Collingwood perfected their characters and song punch lines album by album, but this one was like a wacko fluke that just worked.

Are you alone now
Did you lose the monkey
He gave you backaches

And now you slouch.

He didn't mean it
He's just a dumb ape
Reading Playboy
On your couch.

And now it's time to say
What I forgot to say.
Baby baby baby
Come on, what's wrong
It's a radiation vibe I'm groovin on.
Don't it make you want to get some sun
Shine on, shine on, shine on.

I went to Pittsburgh
And joined a pro team
Talk about a bad dream
I broke a knee.

But I can still croon
And make the girls swoon
Isn't that the way life's
Supposed to be.

But now it's time to say
What I forgot to say
Baby baby baby
Come on, what's wrong
It's a radiation vibe I'm groovin on
Don't it make you want to get some sun
Shine on, shine on, shine on
Shine on, shine on, shine on

The video is typical of that smart ass buzz that was typical of the times. Feet tapping in time while others are nailed to the floor, some weird scenes that seem inspired by "Eraserhead," and a Rod Serling look-alike with a cigarette in hand with swirling black and white backdrop.

Fountains Of Wayne - Radiation Vibe
Uploaded by jesus_lizard

Lloyd Cole -- "She's A Girl and I'm A Man" (1991)

Lloyd Cole is the true definition of an adult rock cult artist.

In the mid-80's, Lloyd Cole and the Commotions had a good success ride overseas with their folk/rock blend of Dylan and the Talking Heads. Cole stuffed a lot of words into stream of consciousness songs like "Perfect Skin" at almost early Springsteen-like levels. In States, the band was strictly under the radar.

By the time he ditched the Commotions and released his second solo album, Don't Get Weird On Me Babe, Cole had moved to the United States and recruited some of the same brilliant musicians who played on Matthew Sweet's classic power pop album, Girlfriend, like Fred Maher and Robert Quine. It may not have been a coincidence, since he was definitely aiming for some kind of crossover success, betting on intelligent guitar-driven power pop and ballads, so why not employ a similar cast?

His real gambit was the single "She's A Girl and I'm A Man," a clever tale of turning the tables sexism that probably went over the heads of many listeners not hip to the lyric's irony. Thankfully, alternative radio and college programmers got the message and dug the big echoey guitar riffs, mammoth melody and four on the floor drums.

When you first listen, you think some of the words are a bit harsh, but then you realize there's a lot more going on. The song pries into the male psyche of putting women down, getting hitched, only to find out that his wife is sharper than him: "You're not cool, you're just like me, you're a stupid man...." With lyrics this subtle, you had to listen to it a couple of times to appreciate Cole's ambitious songwriting craft.

She said she didn't understand him so she guessed he was deep.
He swore he'd never been to college and was too tall to be.
So as she led him to the slaughter thinking she'd be laughing last.
Now the lady in the question is his better half.

She's got to be the stupidest girl I've ever seen.
She don't care who, why, or where I've been.
She's got a right to be, with all that's wrong with me.
But she doesn't want to understand .
That she's a girl and I'm a man.

He thought that women and drink would make a man out of him.
But the extent of his studies left a jaded man.
So as she led him to the altar he was easily led.
And when they asked him if he did, well then, this is what he said.

She's got to be the stupidest girl I've ever seen.
She don't care who, why, or where I've been.
She's got a right to be, with all that's wrong with me.
But she doesn't want to understand .
That she's a girl and I'm a man.

Every time she's near me
She gives me a new reason to be alive
To try to get right
She looks right through me
She says you're not cool, you're just like me
You're a stupid man
Get over here, hold my stupid hand
She's all right...

If you're morose over the deteriorating state of adult rock music, then do yourself a favor and have your faith restored by buying a used copy of Don't Get Weird On Me Babe. Enjoy the video here on You Tube (there's no embed code, unfortunately) and the beautiful gold hollow body guitar Cole plays in it.

Nobody Does It Better: The James Bond Theme Songs From Best to Worst

AS HEARD ON NPR'S "ALL THINGS CONSIDERED"

With "Quantum of Solace" opening this weekend, this is a timely opportunity to evaluate all the James Bond theme songs from best to worst.

Performing the title song to a James Bond movie used to be a musician's badge of honor, and many of them became hits. However, starting with the film "License to Kill" in 1989, not only did the hits dry up, the songs almost uniformly stunk. Yes, the opening credit visuals that accompanied them were still stunning and the movies they went with were almost always excellent. But that musical badge of honor didn't mean anything if they didn't deliver the goods.

The James Bond franchise is very special, but certainly one of the main contributing elements has been the music. Never has there ever been such a long series of films so closely aligned with the style and output of one composer, the brilliant John Barry. The producers lucked out with the English jazz trumpeter and orchestrator, who had such an individual style, emphasizing big brass stabs, swinging jazzy chops, and a penchant for blending major and minor chords for stark effect over three decades.

Most of Barry's theme songs (which he co-wrote with different lyricists) were either big sassy numbers like "Goldfinger" and "Thunderball" that became stylistically dated as the 70's rolled on, or straight-ahead pop ballads like "You Only Live Twice" and "We Have All The Time In The World." He collaborated with rock artists on two theme songs, imparting his signature brass hits on "A View To A Kill" and "The Living Daylights," although the Pretenders did two very cool numbers on the latter soundtrack, which flew under everybody's radar. Three of Barry's theme songs were sung by histrionic Welsh belter Shirley Bassey: "Goldfinger," "Diamonds Are Forever" and "Moonraker." Most Bond title songs have never "rocked."

Barry pioneered the use of signature themes in all his Bond scores, long before John Williams did the same for all the Star Wars and Indiana Jones flicks. The surf guitar of "The James Bond Theme" is as instantly recognizable as the Coke logo. That minor chord pattern in the same theme was dipped into a number of his future scores and songs, and ripped off blatantly for the guitar lick in Johnny Rivers' "Secret Agent Man."

Three times during the Sean Connery/Roger Moore/Timothy Dalton era, the Bond assignment went to different composers and two of those title songs were smashes too. Famous producer George Martin scored "Live and Let Die" so it was inevitable that Paul McCartney did those opening honors, while Bill Conti (best known for the "Rocky" theme) did "For Your Eyes Only." When they hired 80's hitmakers Narada Michael Walden, Jeffrey Cohen and Walter Afanasieff for the "License To Kill" theme song, it understandably bombed along with its pedestrian Michael Kamen score, beginning a still-standing dearth of title song hits.

What makes a good James Bond song, as opposed to just any other song? It has to be seductive, with the sort of "spy"-type arrangements and chords that acid jazz musicians have appreciated for years. Some bombast falling just short of annoying. Lyrically containing those existential "live" and "die" themes that preoccupy the movie titles themselves. Honoring the John Barry tradition of jazzy horn stabs would be admirable.

I've heard the Alicia Keys/Jack White duet "Another Way To Die" from the new film. It has a few of the Bond song trademarks -- darting horns, deep mysterious piano notes, and the word "die" in the title. However, there's a lot of semi-rapping and shouting, not much melody at all, and it takes over 40 seconds to get started. I'll take a pass on this one, unfortunately.

People are always arguing over and listing their favorite James Bond movie, actors, villains and stunts. But I don't recall a ranking of those nearly two dozen theme songs, so here's my totally opinionated evaluation, from worst to best, with links to each title sequence.

20. "Die Another Day" performed by Madonna: A plum assignment handed to the globally famous musical chameleon and she blew it big time. Released the year before her inferior "American Life" album, Madonna foresakes the memorable dance beats of her "Ray of Light" hit for jagged samples and a forgotten thrown together mess. So much for banking on what the producers were hoping would be a sure thing. Totally ridiculous S&M inquisition video too.



19. "License To Kill" performed by Gladys Knight: Sampling the horn hook from "Goldfinger" (and paying the original composers the royalties too), the songwriting team behind 80's Whitney Houston, Mariah Carey, Aretha Franklin and Starship hits forces poor Motown great Glady Knight to grumble in a low register and spend a lot of time groaning "Uh-huh" and "license to kill!"





18. "The Man With The Golden Gun" performed by Lulu: The corniest title song ever composed by John Barry matched this equally silly film. Sample awful lyric: "His eye may be on you or me/Who will he bang?/We shall see!" Somebody dragged obscure English 60's pop sonstress Lulu out of the mothballs in 1974 to sing this one. Not worthy of John Barry stature by any means. The Alice Cooper song of the same name was far better.



17. "The World Is Not Enough" performed by Garbage: Current Bond score composer David Arnold has yet to create a good title song to this day. Trying to turn Garbage lead singer Shirley Manson into a chantreuse was a huge mistake and this sounds nothing like the crunchy grungy rock of Garbage. This is a very ordinary song, far from the standards of what a Bond title tune should be.



16. "Tomorrow Never Dies" performed by Sheryl Crow: One would have hoped this could have been a rocking Bond theme song with Crow in place, much like what I anticipated from Garbage. Instead, Crow rolls out an unmelodic swaying ballad which just comes and goes with no notice, much like "The World Is Not Enough."




15. "Moonraker" performed by Shirley Bassey: Coming on the heels of Carly Simon's enormous 70's contemporary pop hit of "Nobody Does It Better," pulling Bassey out for one last glitzy over the top rendition felt like the franchise took one step backwards. While the song was bonafide John Barry, with those delicately placed strings and his trademark major-minor chord transitions, it was not one of his best and too Las Vegas-y to make it up the charts.

14. "You Know My Name" performed by Chris Cornell: Finally getting close to the mark, new Bond score composer David Arnold joined forces with great rock baritone Cornell for something that sounds, well, James Bond-ish. Charging distorted guitars, rising strings, a pounding sense of desperation, and a real rock song melody. Appropriate that it appears in the film series' recent return to old school form.



13. "For Your Eyes Only" performed by Sheena Easton: Notable for being the only Bond title song where the artist actually appeared in the opening credits, "For Your Eyes Only" was a nice smooth pop ballad with a good hook and a babe on the vocals. Very synthetic and perfect production values.



12. "Goldeneye" performed by Tina Turner: Many surprises here. Turner was made for singing a Bond title song and it's a revelation that it took until 17 movies for somebody to come up with that idea. Give all the credit to writers U2's Bono and The Edge, along with urban producer Nellee Hooper, who created all the earmarks of danger and mystery: finger snaps, a bursting brass riff, a choppy rimshot-driven drum loop, and low pizaccato strings evolving to the romantic undertones that had been missing for so long.



11. "All Time High" performed by Rita Coolidge: Thankfully not using the title "Octopussy" anywhere in it, Barry swung for the adult contemporary radio format fences and got himself a huge hit. You know it's Barry by the giveaway string arrangements. This was Coolidge's last chart-topper, as it came at the end of a run of successful soft rock covers ("We're All Alone" and "Higher and Higher").



10. "Diamonds Are Forever" performed by Shirley Bassey: For Sean Connery's last Bond venture, Barry put a little more swing into Bassey's bellowing ("Diamonds are forever, forever, forever"), some blatant sexual innuendo ("Hold one up and then caress it/Touch it, stroke it and undress it"), a dose of guitar wah wah, and plenty of seductiveness.




9. "Live and Let Die" performed by Paul McCartney & Wings: A truly bizarre song for the Bond genre, employing McCartney's tried-and-true "three songs in one" gimmick (see: "Band On The Run," "Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey"). The lyrics are utter nonsense, and there's much ado going on with big orchestra runs with chase scene riffs, with that dramatic unexpected minor chord ending.


8. "Nobody Does It Better" performed by Carly Simon: A perfect 70's hitmaking machine behind this huge pop hit -- composer Marvin Hamlisch and lyricist Carole Bayer Sager, cranking out a fluffy concoction that transcended the Bond movie into a popular catch phrase of the era.







7. "From Russia With Love" performed by Matt Munro: There's something truly Rat Pack-ish about this song, as you can almost picture Sinatra belting this one out in a nightclub. With Lionel Bart's dashing playboy lyrics ("From Russia with love/I fly to you/Much wiser since my goodbye to you/I've travelled the world to learn/I must return/From Russia with love") and the Slavic tack piano effects, this was the series' "Strangers In The Night."




6. "A View To A Kill" performed by Duran Duran: This is the first Bond song that actually "rocked" and did it very successfully. The New Wave stars collaborated with Barry on a horn-hit filled 80's-styled danceable rock tune with those immortal words: "Dance into the fire/The fatal kiss is all we need!" Crunching heavily-compressed power guitar chords and funky little Strat licks, those immortal Bond minor chords simmering underneath, Duran Duran and Barry's joint venture still sounds well today, especially to 80's nostalgia fiends.


5. "On Her Majesty's Secret Service" performed by The John Barry Orchestra: The title theme of a movie full of "only's" -- the only film to star George Lazenby as James Bond, the only film directed by renowned editor Peter Hunt, and the only film to have an instrumental title sequence. If you thought the James Bond theme itself was wicked, this came in a very close second. Oozing cool, Barry's composition sounds like the best action chase music from the late 60's, building horns, changing keys, and a fuzzy harpsicord-sounding Moog synthesizer running down the twisting baseline.


4. "Thunderball" performed by Tom Jones: The Welsh singing god of the 60's rips his shirt open once more in this bombastic ode to the man who "runs while others walk." Surrounded by a maximum horn riff as beguiling as the one Barry created for "Goldfinger," I can always picture the silhouetted female scuba divers from this film's credit sequence. You've got to hand it to Mr. Jones when he used every ounce of air in his lungs when he explodes with that last "Thun-der-bal-l-l-l!"


3. "The Living Daylights" performed by a-ha: I have great love for this song which went nowhere in the US but of course was a huge European hit. The Norweigian synth pop group collaborated with Barry, like Duran Duran, and produced the sleeper of the whole bunch. As I wrote back on this blog in December 2007: "a truly compelling title song, with tricky key changes, wide open production, a veritable mix of dark Europop and John Barry snazz... Heavily treated electric guitars, hard acoustic guitar strums at emphatic parts, galloping drums with suddenly building snares, twinkling synths, a distorted sax solo, and the falsettos and harmonies of the group itself. John Barry comes in loud and clear with his trademark brassy blasts during the intro and the chorus. Listen for the in-time horseshoes when the song settles in about halfway through before that dirty sax solo."


2. "Goldfinger" performed by Shirley Bassey: The flagship Bond song -- huge, pompous, and mysterious. The blueprint for all future lyricists assigned to focus on a villian as their subject. Parodied and worshipped, Barry's masterwork came in the third Bond film, where he was allowed to step out for the score from beginning to end. Where did he come up those chords for the words "Goldfinger" -- an F major leading to a D flat? Hats off to lyricists Anthony Newley and Lesley Bricusse for coming up with the phrase that he had such a "cold finger." My God.



1. "You Only Live Twice" performed by Nancy Sinatra: This movie and song had a profound effect on me in 1967, as it was the first Bond film I saw in a theater, in this case, the Green Acres Theater in Valley Stream, Long Island. The combination of Sean Connery machine gunning around in that flying Little Nellie, bodies flying through the air from explosions inside the empty volcano crater, exotic Japanese women, and spaceships eating other spaceships was mesmerizing. But that song -- Nancy Sinatra's sexy voice mysteriously floating through the classic Barry melody, with those endless major/minor chord switches, the downward cascading strings, and the Asian influenced xylophone notes, accompanying the literal explosions of chrysanthemum color of the Maurice Binder-designed credits. I never get tired of this song and I knew I was justified when I heard Coldplay perform it live on the b-side of a CD single I bought in the UK several years ago.


SPECIAL MENTIONS

Although these songs were not the "title" theme songs, they were prominently featured on the soundtracks and I consider them very worthy and prime additions to the Bond genre.

• "We Have All The Time In The World" performed by Louis Armstrong: The very last performance from the great jazz trumpeter, the song has great simplicity and poignancy that reflects the ironic jarring ending of "On Her Majesty's Secret Service." Armstrong enunciates every syllable delicately while Barry's swirling strings hit you right in the gut.

• "Where Has Everybody Gone?" and "If There Was A Man" performed by The Pretenders: These are two treats on soundtrack of "The Living Daylights," true collaborations between Chrissy Hynde and John Barry. The former is a snarling Bond-ish rocker with mocking open trumpets and switchblade guitar work, while the latter is one of the most beautiful ballads ever to appear in a 007 movie.
  

Tasmin Archer -- "Sleeping Satellite" (1992)

Did you ever hear a song somewhere that made you stop and say, wow, what a voice... and what a song?

That was the case with Tasmin Archer, when I bought one of those various artist compilation discs on a London trip. I've got a bunch of these at home, all stuffed with UK Top 40 and indie label hits at the time of their release.

I had no idea who Tasmin Archer was, but when this song came on right after Annie Lennox's "Walking On Broken Glass," I was like wow, let me play that again. And I did... many times over. "Sleeping Satellite" barely scratched the surface of anything resembling a hit in the States, it made a brief blip and was then gone, so it became my song to put on friends' mix tapes and turn them on. In the UK, "Sleeping Satellite" went right to #1.

The first thing that grabbed me was this nearly cold opening right on the song's dramatic chorus with a forcefully strummed minor chord on an acoustic guitar and startling lyrics sung by an equally strident female voice and nothing else:

I blame you for the moonlit sky
and the dream that died
with the eagle's flight.
I blame you for the moonlit nights
when I wonder why
are the seas still dry?
Don't blame this sleeping satellite...

In an example of a singer/songwriter matched with an arrangement that matches her vocal command, "Sleeping Satellite" then just gallops with a breezy snare, piano and lightly chorused guitar. And it's not until the end of the second verse when Archer really lets the bottom drop in her voice with guttural declaration:

Did we fly to the moon too soon?
Did we squander the chance?
In the rush of the race
in the reason we chase is lost in romance
and still we try
to justify the waste
for a taste of man's.. greatest adventure.

And it's on those "greatest adventure" words where she powers it up like a chainsaw and you know you are heading into an emotional ride, a really great song.

With every subsequent chorus, more instruments come into the mix, the beat picks up slightly, the drums, guitars and keyboards increasing in volume and urgency, a handclap blending with the beat after the break, and a simple slightly detuned organ notes gliding around.

I found a copy of Archer's debut album, Great Expectations, released on EMI, and I noticed on the cover that she was an attractive black woman singing rock. Of course, my initial thought was "here's another Tracey Chapman." Except where Chapman's sound was raw, dark and based in blues and protest music, Archer was much smoother and carried by London's top studio musicians. Unfortunately, nothing else on the album could match the impact of "Sleeping Satellite."

Online, there are two different "official" videos for "Sleeping Satellite": the hokey somewhat gothic-visualed British version (I don't know what they could have possibly been thinking) with the song's original mix; and the completely different US version, which is fairly better and a different mix (with a noticeable electric guitar solo at the end).

There are also numerous cover versions done by various artists from European countries, including a very slow "quiet storm" acoustic version by some Barcelona band, and a remix to a hip hop drumbeat!

I'm going to spare you the UK video, and give you Archer's live performance on "Top of The Pops," followed by a really beautifully done anime cartoon using "Kingdom Hearts" clips done to the song (excellent acoustics too). Listen to this second one in how the drums get pushed up front when Archer finishes the second verse -- that's how to mix and arrange a song!

The Pet Shop Boys -- "So Hard" (1990)

The Penn and Teller of the English synthpop world had released a number of great singles but hit the jackpot with the Behaviour album in 1990. Where the duo could have picked all kinds of big name collaborators, they chose German musician/producer Harold Faltermeyer, whose biggest claim to fame before that was composing and writing the "Axel F Theme" from Beverly Hills Cop.

The Pet Shop Boys represented a striking confluence of disco and DJ culture, gay subtext, and artsy pretensions. Former Smash Hits magazine editor Neil Tennant sings in a slightly nasal tones, pretty much devoid of emotion, but carrying a melody quite well and full of irony. Their lyrics had sort of a journalistic bite, alluding to gay relationships, dependencies ("Rent") and trysts, but never quite giving it all away. They had an unquestionable devotion to the art and artifice of pop music, and often celebrated it in their songs and shows.

The Pet Shop Boys present an interesting contrast with the just-discussed New Order. Both created dance music and relished their 12" extended remixes, but that's where the comparisons ended: whereas New Order incorporated a lot of live instruments into their music, the Pet Shop Boys were all about the synthesizers, and a lot of them.

Whatever the music skills of the Boys, they always made a point of teaming with the best synthesizer and drum programmers as well as remixers in Europe, notably Julian Mendelsohn and Shep Pettibone early on. However, Behaviour was a real tour de force of analog synth programming, layered, EQ'd and arranged brilliantly.

"So Hard" opens with a short flying percussion pattern, some introductory kicks and spacey pads. The kick then goes straight 4/4, the hi hats move in, a woosh of a keyboard, giving way to the throbbing synth bass line and a minor key Fairlight riff. The instrumentation is definitely house music-based, lots of little hits and bleeps quantized in time with the groove. The narrator is again in a frustrating relationship, and as if often the case with The Pet Shop Boys, playing head games:

I double-cross you and you get mysterious mail
I've tried hard not to shock you
It's hard not to with the things I could say.

Tell me why don't we try
not to break our hearts and make it so hard for ourselves?
Why don't we try not to break our hearts
and make it so hard for ourselves?

You lock your letters in a box
and you've hidden the key
I go one better - I'm indebted to a contact magazine.

Tell me why don't we try
not to break our hearts and make it so hard for ourselves?
Why don't we try not to break our hearts
and make it so hard for us?


The Pet Shop Boys put angst to a disco beat. The song's break delivers it in spades:


Everybody's got to live together
just to find a little peace of mind there
If you give up your affairs forever
I will give up mine
But it's hard
so hard.


The group's best album coincided with their first major tour of America, one which I caught with my then-girlfriend (later wife) at Radio City Music Hall. I use the term "concert" loosely here because there was nothing traditional about it -- it was closer to theater and performance art, with numerous costumed dancers and players, a lot of pre-programmed synths and drum machines, and Tennant and Lowe casually moving in and out of the scenery, very much keeping with their low-key composure.

And Harold Faltermeyer? Despite the success of Behaviour, that was his last major commercial harrah.

Below is the official video, a strange black and white number shot around Newcastle in the UK. With various scenes of two couples having found outdoors, playing pool and pinball, the Boys appear like mysterious ghostly figures, Tennant singing with total ennui and Lowe not saying anything and sometimes just staring into space. They are accompanied by what look like bulky black bodyguards everywhere they go. If I put my English majors cap on, I'd say the PSB are the guilty consciences of the foursome, motioning blankly like the cats that ate the rat. By the video's end, it seems that one guy is checking out the other girl, and gets slapped for his trouble.

By the way, if you enjoy the Pet Shop Boys, you owe it to yourself to investigate the Pet Shop Boys Song-By-Song Commentary site, "Interpretations and Analyses of Every Song Written or Performed by Chris Lowe and Neil Tennant" by Wayne Studer, Ph.D.

The Gin Blossoms -- "Til I Hear It From You" (1995)

Every once in a while, a truly great power pop song actually does make the charts, somehow breaking through whatever the musical fad is of those times. And that song is so good, it defies whatever obstacles may surround it.

By the time the soundtrack to this film came out, the Arizona-originated Gin Blossoms already had a head of steam from their happily titled New Miserable Experience. That album had three FM radio favorites -- "Alison Road," "Found Out About You" and "Hey Jealousy." While the grunge movement was in full swing, these guys lightened it up with jangling electric guitars, sweet harmonies, and the emotional swagger of lead singer Robin Wilson.

The Gin Blossoms had the luck of contributing "Til I Hear It From You," co-written with singer/songwriter ace Marshall Crenshaw, on the soundtrack of Empire Records, a movie that opened dead on arrival. As a matter of fact, I don't even remember it opening at all in the New York area. It was notable for featuring babe-on-the-rise Liv Tyler, and directed by Alan Moyle, who had also done the same duties for the 1990 cult Christian Slater pirate radio/teen flick "Pump Up The Volume." Empire Records was the last of a dying breed, the "teens rebel against the big corporate giant and finally win" film. Yet, one of my former employees once told me this was her favorite film.

While the Empire Records soundtrack had the usual mix of name artists (Evan Dando, Better Than Ezra) and no names (The Ape Hangers? The Cruel Sea?), "Til I Hear It From You" burst out so hard and fast that when it was announced it was from the soundtrack of Empire Records, people probably asked "What movie was that?"

When you bring along Marshall Crenshaw to be your co-writer, you know you're upping the songwriting ante. As great a songwriter as he is, nobody would ever confuse him for pop songwriting machine Diane Warren. This song may have been Crenshaw's highest-charting success as a songwriter.

"Til I Hear It From You" was the Byrds reborn, more of those jangling guitars in a G-Em-Bm-D pattern and a straightforward catchy chorus based on the simple C and D chords. These guys were going for nothing less than the motherlode hit, doing the old pop trick of repeating that melody hook again and again and again. Even the instrumental break had the guitars playing the chorus melody line note for note behind an erupting marching snare drum volcano. And at the end, layered harmonies over and over that descending G chord pattern in the chorus.

Looking back, you'd have to say wow, what a miracle that a song like this crashed through the charts at all. Grunge still had rock and roll on the public's mind, and they sure did like it with their pop hooks (see Third Eye Blind's "Semi-Charmed Life"), before it all gave way to boy bands, rap and hip-hop.

Bizarro band note: I thought I heard singer Robin Wilson say he now lives in Valley Stream, Long Island?

Here's the international non-Empire Records video of the Gin Blossoms'"Til I Hear It From You."

Jellyfish -- "That Is Why" (1990)

In the power pop world, Jellyfish is considered the last "great" band of the genre. I'm not kidding. The Colorado-based Not Lame label even sells a double-CD tribute to the band where artists from all over the world contribute songs in the sequential order of the band's two albums.

When the debut album Bellybutton appeared on the Virgin-distributed Charisma label, the "power pop" description didn't enter my mind and it still really doesn't, despite the Not Lame insistence. Many old-time definition power poppers revere the Beatles through Revolver and The Who before Tommy. Jellyfish bares only a passing resemblance to them and the other "great" power pop bands like The Raspberries, Badfinger and Cheap Trick. There are no power chord arrangements wrapped up nicely in three minutes.

Jellyfish is more akin to Ambrosia and XTC -- melodic "art rock" utilizing a spectrum of instruments, both traditional and non-traditional. First of all, the album is called Bellybutton, so you know somehow these guys are pulling your leg in an "off" way. Secondly, look at that cover -- that's not the cover of a power pop band, but really a blend of psychedelics, fantasy, and lots of color.

The San Francisco-based quartet recorded Bellybutton with Alby Galuten, best known for being Barry Gibb's right-hand co-producer for all the last big Bee Gees run in America (including Saturday Night Fever), and his work with Barbara Streisand (Guilty), Diana Ross ("Chain Reaction") and Dionne Warwick ("Heartbreaker). Stylistically, there's nothing those acts had in common with Jellyfish, but they must have been on the same audio and conceptual page.

Bellybutton turned out to be a real "headphone" album, as the mix engineering was truly panoramic for what was an eccentric and slick pop record. You knew that from the very beginning, when you hear a very faint organ playing, and then it launches into the slow bluesy "The Man I Used To Be," with distorted guitar scratches, cinematic strings, and precise high bells like the kind you'd hear in a high school band.

This was a very ambitious band who sought to achieve a singular style unlike anybody else's, although you could certainly hear the influences of 70's acts like Supertramp, Queen and 10cc. It was almost as if they stepped out of that decade through a time machine, dressing in bell bottoms and a Cat in the Hat topper.

Jellyfish produced sophisticated pop which operated both traditionally and experimentally at the same time. Case in point is my favorite song from the album, "That Is Why," which has a breathtaking chorus underscored by Jason Falkner's counterpoint guitar. The verses are bouncy in the literal sense of the word, with Andy Sturmer's toms coming out for what may be best described as "licks" (!) at the end of each line.

Though it's hard to admit it's true
I've come to depend on you
You and your angelic shout
Loud enough for two

And that is why
I'll confide in you the truth this time
That is why
I just can't go on and live this lie

Yesterday all was right as rain
But now the forecast's not
It's partly cloudy with trouser stains
And his copy of enquiring minds

But that never meant that much to her
She chose to keep her nose too clean
She'd rather keep it pointed anyway
In the spine of a magazine

And when you say I trust in you
I promise you the truth
And when you say I bet you won't
You know I will
And it'll be better in the end

So when you think you've got it figured out
Then you know you don't
Like all the rest you'd like to sit and pout
But of course you won't


"That Is Why" was such a terrific song that Rhino included it on its Poptopia power pop compilations in the 90's.

With all kinds of band infighting, Falkner left after Bellybutton to start his own solo career, producing some of my favorite music of the last 10 years (and not enough of it, I may add). As a duo, Jellyfish recorded its second and last album, Spilt Milk, which some people consider an even better album (but not me). Drummer Andy Sturmer went on to produce the great Swedish power pop act The Merrymakers' Bubblegun album (discussed on this blog here), the Japanese pop band Puffy AmiYumi and compose for various animated TV series (like "Teen Titans").

Here are some wonderful Jellyfish videos. First, the official video for "That Is Why." You'll notice that drummer Andy Sturmer stood up while playing so he could sing and perhaps get more power that way. The second is a 1993 in-store all-acoustic version of the song while promoting Spilt Milk in Philadelphia. A third is the band performing their highest charting single, "Baby's Coming Back," live on German TV. The fourth is the official video for another favorite from Bellybutton, "The King Is Half-Undressed," which features outfits straight out of Dr. Seuss. And finally, Jason Falkner-era Jellyfish covering Fleetwood Mac's "Go Your Own Way" in Frankfurt, Germany (that's the blond guy on the left playing the Telecaster).

"THAT IS WHY" (official video)

"THAT IS WHY" (1993 in-store performance in Philadelphia)

"BABY'S COMING BACK" (live performance on German TV)

"THE KING IS HALF-UNDRESSED" (official video from 1990)

"GO YOUR OWN WAY" (Fleetwood Mac cover, finale of Frankfurt, Germany concert)