Upcoming power pop.

I'm firmly convinced 2012 has been a far better year for power pop than 2011, and here come two more upcoming releases that will be vying for a top spot on a very competitive year-end list.

First up is the long-awaited return of David Grahame, who hasn't put a proper full-length album since 2004's DT & The Disagreeables, but has now teamed up with Lane Steinberg for a project titled - you guessed it - Grahame Steinberg. It's due out next month, and below is a 10-minute sampler of all the tracks. It almost works a medley unto itself, and it stands to be the most interesting power pop collaboration since Seth Swirsky and Mike Ruekberg got together:



Also back for the first time in several years is The World Record, last heard from with the great Guitars Forever in 2006. They're making up for lost time by giving us an 18-track double "album", also available in 23-track form on LP, due on October 9. To whet your appetite, they have a 7-track sampler up for your listening pleasure. Andy Creighton & Co. sound just as good as ever (EDIT: here's the full album now for streaming):

New David Grahame Out

David Grahame has a new untitled album out, and Bruce at Not Lame has the limited 75-copy run. Aside from the limited quantities, there's a catch: It's priced at $11.50 per track. And there are only two tracks.

Sounds enticing, right? Actually the two tracks are two long song medleys that total 55 minutes, so it is the length of a full album. Apparently, Grahame is taking a page out of Lannie Flowers' (and Paul Westerberg's) book. This kind of thing isn't my cup of tea as I'm an iPod guy, and I'm not into 20+ minute tracks (I'm a huge Westerberg fan for example, and I have his 44:00 mp3, but I've never listened to the whole thing through once). But if you're a Grahame fan with $23 to burn and a long attention span, act now while Bruce still has them in stock.

Not Lame | mp3 of samples

David Grahame update.

When we last left David Grahame, he was selling his new tracks at $2 a pop from his website, a business model that caused some fair controversy on the Audities list and led to a lot of skepticism from those who would otherwise buy (including myself).

I'm happy to report now that not only is he no longer charging $2/song, he's made all the tracks, along with outtakes from DT & The Disagreeables and Supergenius, available in a 6-song EP CD-R for $5.99 ($7.49 after shipping), so now, a la Jim Cramer, I can put in a "buy" recommendation on this.

Jim Cramer says "BUY! BUY! BUY! DAVID GRAHAME NOW!"

Updates & Miscellany.

By way of follow-up on some earlier posts, and some other things that I've been meaning to mention over the week or so since I last posted:

* I made reference a few weeks ago to a new David Grahame album becoming available through downloads from his official site. It now turns out that Grahame is only releasing individual tracks as he completes them, and not only are they going for $2 a pop, he's not making any previews of them available before purchase so as to preserve the surprise element. This business model of Grahame's has created quite a lengthy discussion on Audities, with the general consensus being that it's too steep a price, and even those who feel they could justify spending $2/track are put off by the lack of ability to sample the tracks. It is kind of a "pig in a poke" type of setup here, especially with Grahame's hints of a departure from his earlier sound. If anyone here has heard the tracks, please post a comment with your take on them, and if by some reason you're reading this Mr. Grahame, feel free to send me the mp3s on a promo basis and I'll be glad to write up my thoughts on them. :)

UPDATE WHILE PREPARING THIS POST: Apparently bowing to semi-popular demand, Grahame has made samples available. After listening to the five 20-30 second snippets, I'm not detecting that radical a change in his sound, with the exception of "The Slide", which has a horn section and sounds kind of bluesy. The others sound nice enough, assuming the snippets are representative of the tracks as a whole. I'm a bit more tempted to shell out the $2, but I'm not quite there yet.

* Contrary to earlier reports, Derby is not imminently releasing their sophomore disc, Posters Fade. It will probably be out later this year, according to their publicist. Nevertheless, the three new tracks are still playing on their site (click on "music") and I remain eager to hear the rest.

* I'd be remiss not to mention that Jason Falkner has a new disc out, but only in Japan. It's titled I'm OK, You're OK, and if you want it now before it gets a US release (if ever), Kool Kat has it for $32. I may have my power pop membership card taken away for saying this, but I've never really gotten into Falkner that much. It's not that I dislike his music, and maybe it's also due to his very spotty track record of solo releases, but for whatever reason his stuff has never jumped out at me. I'll certainly be glad to give the new one a listen, but not for $32.

* Not Lame put up some new discs today, and one of them looked particularly interesting: This Is Grand Atlantic, by the Australian band of the same name. Although this new full-length is not available yet on eMusic, their EP Smoke and Mirrors (which features several of the same tracks on the full-length along with a cover of Abba's "The Winner Takes It All") can be found there.

* Speaking of Not Lame, they've also rolled out the red carpet for the new disc from The Well Wishers, How I Won The War. So head on over and listen away. You know I'm stoked for this, since their previous release, Under The Arrows, was my #5 disc of 2005. I just got the disc in, so I'm not ready for a full report yet, but it sounds like more of the same goodness.

New David Grahame on the way.

David Grahame is someone I'm not sure I've mentioned before on this blog, but it's not because he isn't worthy of mention. He's a true pop genius (I mean his best-of was called Supergenius, so he has to be, right?) and out-McCartneys Sir Paul these days. Anyway, the exciting news is the photo above, the cover art for Welcome to the Dark Ages, his newest release due next month.

The catch is that it will be a download-only release available exclusively from his site. And one other caveat:

As much as I would love to satisfy the curious by posting samples, the album is so dramatically different from any of my previous solo work, that it's best left a surprise to buyers. A nice surprise.

Hmm...should be interesting.