“Take On Me” — literally. — Ryan Allen

Last week, I had the privilege of seeing the Beach Boys’ Brian Wilson live in concert. He played some wonderful stuff (the cuts from Pet Sounds being my personal favorite), and of course, the classic surfin/sunin/funin/lovin/doo-run-runnin hits of their early years (not a personal favorite). While it was all pretty amazing, I couldn’t help but think of this David Lee Roth video the entire time Wilson and his band trudged through “California Girls” — mostly because I watched a insane amount of MTV as a kid, and because this particular video freaked me out for a number of reason: gigantic boobs, a cast of maniac-looking extras, Diamond Dave’s chest hair, etc. Fasten your seatbelts, sign post up a head…a zousy zousy bop, diddly bop! — Ryan Allen

Happy Halloween!

– The Detour Crew

Of Montreal, Skeletal Lamping (Polyvinyl, 2008)

MP3: “Id Engager”

Kevin Barnes must be a terribly difficult man to love. He laid out his case with last year’s psych pop masterpiece Hissing Fauna, Are You The Destroyer?, a record that explored an extraordinarily dark period in his life including nervous breakdowns, suicidal tendencies, chemical imbalance, freaking out after his daughter’s birth and a period of bleak self-isolation in Norway. With Skeletal Lamping, Barnes continues his confessional trend by attempting to let listeners into the darkest corners of his mind. The results are jarringly erratic, emotionally unbalanced and impossible to predict –- which is to say Skeletal Lamping could go by the alternate title, A Tour Through the Mind of a Sexually Deviant, Bi-Polar Individual: The Musical. Yes, it is a harder album to digest than Hissing Fauna, as each track morphs several times making them feel more like medleys than individual songs, but despite the emotional and musical roller coaster, the high points are brilliant and addictive. Skeletal Lamping occasionally veers into rehashed or less memorable musical territory, but like Waiting For Guffman’s Mayor Welsch says about the weather in Blaine, Missouri, just wait five minutes and it’ll change. And with the hard work Of Montreal put into Skeletal Lamping, they really have gotten it down to three or four minutes. So for a disturbingly revealing yet good time, crawl into the mind of Kevin Barnes — and make sure you bring some Zoloft along just in case things get too manic-depressive up in there. — Laura Witkowski

This song reminds me of summer 2000 when at least three of my friends had younger sisters who were fucking guys from the Suicide Machines. Oh, and it also reminds me that this band was friggin’ roids and we should reunite them for our next festival. You down? Tell Royce every time you attend a show at the Stick to make it happen. And also tell him to turn that shit down; Jimmy Fallon’s ears are still ringing from the Go! Team show.

– Harry Caul

Sleeper, “What Do I Do Now?” (1996, Arista)

Quite possibly one of the most underrated Brit-pop bands around in the 1990s, Sleeper had a glimmer of a chance at stardom during the highly-covered “Battle of Brit-pop” between Oasis and Blur. Louise Wener, the sugary sweet, impeccably pop-savvy front woman and the gang (referred to jokingly as the “Sleeperblokes”) snuck into the top 10 of the UK singles chart twice in 1996, while everyone else was too busy slamming each other in the press. Unfortunately, Sleeper broke up in 1998, leaving us with only three albums to obsess over, and a greatest hits album in 2007. Lucky for us, videos of some of their power pop gems are still floating around the Internetz — including “What Do I Do Now,” a synthy nugget of modern rock that is like the perfect amalgam of Pulp’s glammy sneer and Elastica’s jangly femme-pop. — Elle Sawa

Marshall Crenshaw, Marshall Crenshaw (Warner Bros., 1982)

In 1982, no one was looking for the kind of music Detroiter-turned-New Yorker Marshall Crenshaw was making. An ode to Buddy Holly mixed with power pop, Crenshaw’s self-titled debut is like an Americanized, nerdier version of Elvis Costello. Even if being the domestic Costello was a niche market, Crenshaw’s simple pop music structure was still catchy and nostalgic enough to land the single “Someday, Someway” on the Top 40 charts. And that’s just one highlight on a record of many, including (more…)

The Posies, “Solar Sister” (Live @ Phoenix Festival, 1994)

We’re not sure, but this might have been as big as power pop ever got (besides, maybe, those dudes from Fountains of Wayne writing “That Thing You Do”). This clip — from a 1994 performance at something called The Phoenix Festival, not in Arizona, mind you, but in the UK — shows bubble-grunge workhorses the Posies totally ripping one out in front of a crowd of curious Brits. Chances are, they were probably playing around the same time as Menswear or Cast, so forgive them if attendance during their set seems (more…)

Sort of by accident, today has become “Power Pop Day” here at Detour. Now, we realize some of you might be muttering, “What the hell shit is power pop? Where is my latest link to the new hot shit Girl Talk remix?” To that we say, “Relax, future iTunes DJ! We’ll be back to regularly scheduled content next week.” Or, we could just not say anything at all, and link to the Wiki entry on the genre. We could also just tell you to go re-listen to all your New Pornographers records. Or, even better still, we could point ya’ll in the direction of to two lists featuring all your favorite indie rockers naming off their choice power pop jams, courtesy of Magnet Magazine (thanks bros!). Then you could easily do a search on your favorite torrent and grab whatever peaks your interest. Because quite honestly, it would take up way too much space to name bands, explain the genre, and go through some kind of long and involved oral history that has honestly been (more…)