POPTIMIST ALERT

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

YOU CAN STAND UNDER MY UM-BER-ELLA

(reposted from own lj where there is also AUDIO)

The Past? Now let me tell you about the past...

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

I'm interested in how people think about old pop. We spend quite a lot of our time here doing polls about it, but nonetheless I'm going to start another thread on it and see what happens.

Two thoughts specifically:

- "Older sibling syndrome": I remember a conversation I had with Al (my younger brother WINOLJ) a few years ago where he was expressing envy at my having "lived through" acid house and jungle. Obviously he was alive between 88 and 95 too, but he meant "paying attention to music". I explained that I might have been around then but I'd hardly been taking advantage of my raving opportunities. Anyway it struck me that, even though I don't have an older brother myself, I also had always had a fascination with the years just before I got into music, the stuff I'd just missed or had absorbed haphazardly via the Sunday Top 40 show. Does anyone else recognise this?

- When does pop stop?: Not many people tick anything in the 1952-1953 Number Ones polls. Fair enough - this stuff is quite obscure. But there's no sense of curiosity either, or not of curiosity in the sense of "wow maybe there's some great old stuff here". It's too far beyond pop as we understand it to excite much enthusiasm. Are there other, more recent, pockets of 'old pop' which are like this for you - sounds and styles whose appeal is lost or baffling?

The Friday Canon: ELVIS aka THE MONSTER TICK FEST

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

EVEN MORE TICKS THAN CLIFF. Jebus, Mr Presley was a busy bunny! In the first 3 years of his career he released 25 hit singles! And I'm sure he would have kept churning them out at a rate of knots if he hadn't joined the army/made a bunch of rubbish fillums/et less burgers.

I've left off the re-issues but there's still hella-ticky under the cut. You have THIRTY FOUR ticks to show your Elvis love. Uh-huh-huh!

( Everybody in the whole cell block, was ticking to the jailhouse rock )

More random questions?

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

1. Was "This Corrosion" by Sisters Of Mercy ever not pop?

2. Has there ever been a greater contrast between sublime guest star contribution and irritating name artist contribution than Akon and Gwen on "Sweet Escape"?

3. What's going on here?