The oasis of pop for many an Internet surfer, the Not Lame Recording Company is a clearing house for power pop bands of all shapes and sizes - reissued classics and the best new hopefuls from around the world. Label head Bruce Brodeen is a pop fan first and foremost, and his passion for the genre has helped his business grow from a dream into a necessary conduit for many of the lesser known bands to connect with their potential audience. Not Lame also is a record label, home to a few of the brighter lights on the scene like The Rooks and Martin Luther Lennon.
Bruce likes superlatives. Most of the releases in his catalogue are tagged with some variation on the phrase "EXTREMELY HIGHLY RECOMMENDED" to the point where you wonder about the few that don't get the over the top treatment. But ironically, he's right - most of the pop records in his catalogue are very good. So take the title of this CD with a grain of salt - while it isn't the best pop compilation in the world, there are twenty-two tracks by twenty-two different artists, and most of them are very good.
Even the most die hard pop fans will find a track or two that they haven't heard before, but the average listener is going to be blown away by some of the best artists on the current pop scene. Brad Jones is an in-demand producer who's worker with artists like Marshall Crenshaw, but his own record gilt-flake need not take a back seat to anyone. Newcomer Walter Clevenger's The Man With The X-Ray Eyes is turning heads everywhere; and Atlanta resident Kenny Howes blends his 1960's pop influences into a delightful stew of pop nuggets that are as fresh as anything you're likely to hear in 1997.
From Sweden we get The Moptops with their Tom Petty-ish "Plastic Moon Rain". Together with countrymen This Perfect Day they prove that Rickenbackers rule more than Britain and America. (Ditto New Zealand with Dead Flowers and Nova Scotia with Cool Blue Halo). Those familiar with heartland pop will be glad to see cuts from Darren Robbins (here under the guise of Time Bomb Symphony) and Brad Elvis of the Elvis Brothers (from the forthcoming Big Hello CD).
Probably the most ambitious tracks are contributed by Declan Young, whose layered sounds conjures up Jellyfish, and Willie Wisely, who somehow mixes falsetto vocals, dance rhythms, pumping piano and acoustic guitar into one of the most infectious tunes you'll hear all year. My pick to click? Stellaluna, produced by Spongetone Jamie Hoover, with the energetic "Nervous Man".
If you are a pop fan at all - if songs by the Raspberries, Big Star, Badfinger and Dwight Twilley bring a smile to your face and make you reach for that dial - you will love this disk. Not Lame has kept the price way down as an enticement because - let's face it - they want to sell records. They figure that if you hear these bands, you'll like a lot of them, and you'll probably get that wallet out and drop a few bucks. They're right. You will.
So what do I think about this collection?. It's wonderful. It's a great deal at twice the price. Oh, hell....it's EXTREMELY HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!
