Pop Geek Heaven

DECEMBER REVIEWS by Mike Baron CARY MORIN: When I Rise Laid-back front porch blues you might hear on a sultry evening in rural Mississippi in 1949. Singer/picker Cary Morin exudes low-key charm working solo and small group, mostly acoustic, with Dexter Payne’s clarinet on “Let Me Hear The Music,” and harmonica elsewhere. Morin makes no bones about […]

FEBRUARY REVIEWS by Mike Baron BURGESS MEREDITH: A Dimension of Sound “Burgess Meredith is a garage pop 60’s-influenced rock & roll band from Austin, TX.” A little bit garage, a little bit of mad pop science, beginning with “When We Were Born” which has the dense velvet sounds of the Heavy Blinkers, with stacked harmonies. This record is like a circus […]

NOVEMBER REVIEWS by Mike Baron THE GLAD MACHINE (Spirithouse) This Massachusetts quartet’s debut album kills with a sublime collection of crunchy hooks and wailing guitars, with massive Who-type chords. Brad Thayer’s elegant vocals swoop effortlessly from tenor to falsetto, as on the Raspberries-like “Tonight.” “Wave” swirls around a Great Buildings foundation, with a thalamus-pleasing echo […]

OCTOBER REVIEWS by Mike Baron TRIP WIRE: Cold Gas Giants (Kool Kat) Trip Wire is Marty Schneier, Bill Hunt, and Jeff Shelton, all veterans of numerous power pop bands. Together they thrum like a Yamaha, making urgent, propulsive pop in the vein of 20/20 or the Plimsouls, both of whom might have recorded “I’m Not The Enemy.” “This […]

SEPTEMBER REVIEWS by Mike Baron V/A – SONGS, BOND SONGS Andrew Curry, the mastermind behind Here Comes The Reign Again, The Second British Invasion, and Drink A Toast To Innocence, A Tribute to Lite Rock, has done it again with this double CD of every James Bond theme performed by some of power pop’s brightest stars. Songs […]

SUMMER RELEASES by Mike Baron THE HANGABOUTS: Kits & Cats and Saxon Wives (Futureman) Three guys from Michigan in a Chad & Jeremy/Peter & Gordon/Brit invasion mood, very solid follow-up to Illustrated Bird. The layered and seductive guitar on the title track is like one of those appetizers that threatens to ruin the meal for you, because you want […]

JUNE RELEASES by Mike Baron   THE BLOOD RUSH HOUR: Who Folds First (Nicola) The Blood Rush Hour is a cornucopia of styles, beats and ideas melded into a seamless whole, operatic in scope, but rooted in the mad pop science of XTC, David Myhr, Marco Joaquim, The Foreign Films, The Pillbugs, or the Dowling Poole. […]

BLOODY RED BARON APRIL RELEASES by Mike Baron NEAL MORSE BAND: The Similitude Of a Dream (Metal Music) Jaw-dropping two-disc set of prog rock reeking of Pink Floyd, King Crimson, ELP, Yes, Captain Beyond and even AC/DC, based on John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress. I know what you’re thinking—Pilgrim’s Progress, Pilgrim’s Shmogress. It’s a sort of […]

BLOODY RED BARON BEST OF 2016 by Mike Baron As always, it has been a great year for power pop, so much so that I am hard-pressed to limit my list to ten. I’m listing them in no particular order, because sometimes I like oranges and sometimes I like lemons! I couldn’t do without a […]

BLOODY RED BARON November Reviews by Mike Baron   DAVID BROOKINGS: And the Average Lookings Elegant power pop in a Davenports/Rosenbergs/Gin Blossoms mode, with hooks, bridges, and multi-part harmonies. David Brookings uses the whole buffalo in making a song, filling every part with buzzing guitars. “The Optimist” is typical with its minor key theme that breaks […]