By Carl Cafarelli
Although pop music refers literally to any music that is popular, the phrase also describes an approach to melodic rock'n'roll that draws recognizable inspiration from AM radio hits of a bygone era, and specifically from pop's pervasive and prevailing icons, the Beatles. In this realm are a seemingly endless array of obscure but irresistible bands that can only be described as pop, regardless of their actual popularity (or relative lack thereof).
The acts in this installment of Local Spotlight are all vying to attract the audience that put Marshall Crenshaw, Shoes, Material Issue, the Posies and Teenage Fanclub at the top of the pops, however briefly.
Expatriate Syracusan-turned-San-Franciscan Chris von Sneidern (or CVS, as he's known) remains relatively unknown outside of the pure pop underground, but to pop fans he's already a household name. Go! (Mod Lang), his third album, continues in the engaging Badfinger/Big Star/Emitt Rhodes vein of 1993's Sight & Sound and 1994's Big White Lies (both on the Heyday label), maintaining and even surpassing the impeccable standard set by those two superlative pop albums.
If the word "gorgeous" didn't already exist in the dictionary, some wag would be forced to coin it to describe CVS' engaging music. Each of Go!'s 11 tracks are so flawlessly surefooted in the pursuit of pop nirvana that devotees will swear they've stumbled across some hitherto-unknown beyond-the-grave collaboration between Badfinger's Pete Ham and Big Star's Chris Bell. And it's all seasoned with a soulfulness most modern pop couldn't touch with a 10-foot Rickenbacker.
Like many self-avowed pop artists, CVS wears his influences like a shiny new merit badge: You can hear echoes of the past in his Lennonesque vocals, in the frank Beatle references in "North Country Girl," and in the delicious pop gumbo served up in every track. Unlike the case of many fans-turned-artists with an awareness and appreciation of their roots, however, you won't hear any actual nicks from existing pop classics, no crafty homages that border on theft.
CVS acknowledges his influences, but he has created a new work that refuses to be marginalized as a shadow of what came before. With Go!, Chris von Sneidern proves that it's possible to be overtly affected by the rockin' pop of the past and still create new work that is more than a simple rehash. Small wonder that CVS calls his band (and his music publishing business) Pop Gem Factory!
If "Lose Yr Mind," "Tell Me Again" and "Thru the Mirror" don't quicken your pulse, and if "Four Fifty One" doesn't force you to sway in thrall to its charms, then you're simply beyond the giddy appeal of pure pop and should resign yourself to a life of shuffleboard. Go! will most certainly wind up on the year-end Top 10 lists of various pundits, and that's selling it short. Go-geous!
Winner of two out of three Sammys as Syracuse's best songwriter, Frenay helped put power pop on the map locally as bass player for the Flashcubes in the late 1970s. His second solo album Jigsaw People (due in August from Tangible Music) departs from the acoustic approach of his 1993 solo debut Armory Square (Northside Music) with full-band arrangements and the occasional hint of raucousness.
Not that Jigsaw People is primarily a power pop record. In fact, strict power poppers may find the album a disappointment, as it is smooth, somewhat slick and far too laid-back to be considered in the same adrenaline-charged power pop category as, say, the Raspberries or the early Who. Nonetheless, the album's an accomplished, mature pop work, effortlessly mixing flashes of transcendent exuberance with quieter moments of tasteful restraint.
Continuing the Beatles connection, Frenay gets a little help from his friends throughout Jigsaw People. Guests include all of Frenay's fellow Flashcubes (guitar wiz Arty Lenin performs on nine of the album's 14 tracks), plus George Rossi, Pete and Maura Kennedy, Mark Doyle, Ducky Carlisle, Jim Carney and Terry Vickery. Folk singer Catie Curtis makes an appropriate cameo, singing harmony vocals on a cover of her own lovely "Troubled Mind."
Two of the songs here were previously issued in different form on Frenay's 1991 cassette compilation, The Gary Frenay Songbook. "It's All in the Way You Look at It" offers a marked improvement on the Neverly Brothers' chirpy version, as Frenay's rendition here is propelled by Little Georgie's authoritative mandolin and accordion and Lenin's punk-fueled guitar. And the new take on "You're Not the Police" lacks the spunk and punch of the Flashcubes' version on Songbook, but substitutes a strolling groove that is amiable and quite agreeable.
Speaking of the Flashcubes, the entire band is present and accounted for on "You Only Get One Life," a radio-ready blast of vigorous pop that should compel all and sundry to crank the mother up. (Perhaps they'll perform it when the 'Cubes come together for a reunion Saturday, Aug. 3, at Styleen's Rhythm Palace.) "You Only Get One Life" and the album-opening "We Connect" pack the most notable power among Jigsaw People's pop.
The rest of Frenay's new album survives and thrives with a more casual ambiance, from the heartfelt personal vows of devotion in "Opening Day" and "Arlington Avenue" (the latter seasoned with some delicious Hammond B3 from Mark Doyle) through the Tony Bennett-styled ballad "I Need to Be Sure of You."
While Jigsaw's overall slickness is an occasional distraction (the wedding band-cum-roller-rink keyboards on the otherwise lovely "The Way We Carry On" conjure Sonny Farrar crooning the tune for the lounge crowd), its best tracks outshine the gloss. The scraped-raw emotion of "She's Leaving" offers a moving tale of a woman recoiling from an abusive relationship, and the sheer power of "Dancin' at the U.N." manages to transcend its production. Even "Private Catastrophe," the album's least-interesting track (all sheen and no hook), gets by on Frenay's easy-going aura. And "You Only Get One Life" should be wafting over radio airwaves everywhere, if there's any justice.
Frenay also plans to include two bonus tracks (not yet available for review) on the compact disc, both of them covers: a take on the 1940s Jo Stafford standard "Candy," and a duet with Chris von Sneidern on Big Star's "Blue Moon." Frenay remains a local treasure who deserves a much better fate than being buried in Syracuse.
This all-female, mini-skirt-clad five-piece played in Central New York circa 1979-'80, setting out to be a distaff version of the Beatles and the Raspberries. They wound up a thoroughly wonderful prototype for the Go-Go's, who would employ many of the elements of the Poptarts' battle plan in their successful conquest of the Top 40 charts--while the Poptarts themselves, of course, languished in undeserved obscurity.
Fresh Out of the Toaster, a homemade cassette available only via mail order, marks the Poptarts' legacy by preserving the group's unfinished demos and works-in-progress, offering the world at large a tantalizing glimpse at what it missed.
And the world missed quite a bit. The admittedly cute quintet was dismissed by some for their limited, nascent musical prowess and for the fact they were mere girls presuming to compete in the macho rock arena. So the Poptarts--guitarist-singer Meegan Voss (a.k.a. Debbie Redmond), singer-guitarist Gael McGear (Gael Sweeney), guitarist Cathy Kensington (Cathy Van Patten), bassist Margie Shears (Margie Finer) and drummer Susan Mersey (Susan Jaffe)--dismissed their own detractors in turn, embodying an accomplished DIY spirit and singing that it's easy. Haven't you ever had a pop dream of your own? Hey-hey, we're the Poptarts.
While its rough-hewn production prevents Fresh Out of the Toaster from achieving pop perfection, its 30 (!) tracks nonetheless reveal a young group that should have gone to the toppermost of the poppermost. Production values notwithstanding, many of the songs are flat-out terrific: "Jealousy" and "I Won't Let You Me Go" are the equal of any pop songs this side of the Hollies, while "Words," "August Is a Wicked Month," "Glad She's Gone," "Pop Dream," "I'm Gonna Get You," "It's Easy" and even the "98.6" rip "Sunday Afternoon" are nearly as good. One can only dream of how awesome they'd sound if they existed in a properly finished form.
Paradoxically and maddeningly, the only five Poptarts tracks that did make
it to a final mastered version were woefully overproduced by Bill Murphy. He
buried the Poptarts' natural effervescence under an inappropriate veneer of
perky rhythms and horrid swirling synths, although the studio mess led to a
memorable quote: Guitarist Cathy Kensington complaining, "Murphy cut our
balls off, and we didn't even have any!"
Small matter. Although unfinished and ultimately frustrating in its tale of pop
dreams unfulfilled, Fresh Out of the Toaster is nothing short of
essential listening for pop enthusiasts and students of Syracuse's
late-Seventies new wave scene. There is some discussion of a revamped CD
release, and even tentative talk of a Poptarts reunion show. Both of these
potential developments should be eagerly encouraged. For now, though, pop fans
owe it to themselves to grab the cassette for a fascinating hint of what might
have been.
Fresh Out of the Toaster is available for $5, including postage, from Gael McGear Sweeney, 272 Lorraine Ave. No. 2, Syracuse 13210.