Weekend Roundup.

First in Space-In the Red. Johnny Stanec and the boys from Youngstown are back with their fourth full-length, and it just might be their best, trading in the Replacements-style rock of the last album for a purer pop sound. Although you wouldn't tell from the driving opener "Letters from Hell", it becomes evident on tracks like the bouncy "Forward Progress" and the midtempo, Gin Blossoms-like "The Other Side", and "Now or Never" is straight-up power pop reminiscent of Cliff Hillis or Michael Carpenter. And you only have to in the red for $5 for a digital copy at Bandcamp.

CD Baby | iTunes



VA-Here Comes the Reign Again: The Second British Invasion. Andrew Curry has done it again. After last year's compilation of contemporary power poppers covering the lite rock classics of the late 70s, Curry has gotten another all-star cast together to tackle the next decade when all those British bands came out of nowhere thanks to the emergence of MTV. Now while last year's comp was my favorite album of the year, this one - while executed just as well - may not achieve those heights due to my own personal preference for those late-70s tracks versus some of the synth-heavy sounds of the early 80s. Still there's plenty here to enjoy (and even geek out over if you're a bigger fan of the era than I) and like on the last compilation, the best covers here are those that sound like natural extensions of the artists covering them. So the suburban milieu of "Life in a Northern Town" is a perfect fit for Fountains of Wayne's Chris Collingwood, and "Everytime You Go Away" sounds so much like a typical Linus of Hollywood track that I forgot it was a cover when listening to it alongside his most recent release. Also in this category are "Save a Prayer", which is in David Mead's ballad wheelhouse, and the pure midetempo pop of "Wouldn't it Be Good" in Cliff Hillis's hands. Then you have the reinterpretations, and the ones that work here best are Mike Viola slowing down "Everybody Wants to Rule the World" and Graham Alexander doing likewise with Tracey Ullman's "They Don't Know". This is another must for power pop fans.

CD Baby | iTunes

CD of the Day, 5/9/13: VA-Drink a Toast to Innocence: A Tribute to Lite Rock

Perhaps the most anticipated release of 2013 to date has been Andrew Curry's "Monsters of Lite Rock" project, funded by Kickstarter, to assemble a compilation of those sort-of-cheesy "lite rock" (also known as "yacht rock") hits of the late 70s and early 80s covered by today's power pop artists. The Kickstarter was successful, and the fruits of Curry's (and the artists') labor is here with the double-disc, 28-track Drink a Toast to Innocence. The lineup Curry has assembled is impressive, featuring the likes of Bleu, Mike Viola, Willie Wisely, David Myhr, Michael Carpenter, Linus of Hollywood, Seth Swirsky and so many more of my (and your) favorite artists.

As with most covers compilations, Toast features the usual mix of faithful re-creations and bold re-imaginings. To what degree you prefer either is always affected by the level of your fondness for the original and the covering artist, but there are plenty of each to choose from here. To me, however, my favorite covers have fallen into a third category: covers that sound like they could have originals by the covering artist. In other words, they make the cover their own. The two here that stand out in that regard are Greg Pope's cover of Poco's "Crazy Love" and Lannie Flowers' version of the Orleans staple "Dance With Me". In Pope's case, it's a great match of cover and artist; by taking the original and speeding it up just a microsopic bit it sounds like one of his typical slightly off-kilter pop gems, while Flowers turns "Dance With Me" into one of his usual rollicking (and rocking) power pop numbers by adding a honky-tonk piano to the mix in contrast to the highly laid-back original.

In the re-imagining department, there are several standouts. The Davenports turn Randy Van Warmer's borderline treacly "Just When I Needed You Most" into a driving power pop track, Lisa Mychols speeds up the David Soul (of Starsky & Hutch fame) ballad "Don't Give Up on Us" and gives it the full-band treatment, while Willie Wisely takes the sexual subtext of The Atlanta Rhythm Section's "So Into You" and makes it the text, complete with moaning female vocals in the outro. Also rocking things up a bit is Vegas With Randolph and their version of Little River Band's "Cool Change". Plus I give them credit for keeping a straight face while singing lines like "The albatross and the whales/they are my brother".

As for the faithful covers, there are plenty to choose from here. Kyle Vincent, whose style is pretty much 70's lite rock and would be a natural to cover any of the songs featured here, is perfect on Ambrosia's "How Much I Feel"; ex-Merrymaker David Myhr captures the spirit of 10cc with "The Things We Do for Love", and the two halves of The Red Button play to their strengths - Mike Rukeberg with the power poppy "Believe it or Not" (theme from "The Greatest American Hero") and Seth Swirsky's eerily channels Henry Gross almost note-for-note on "Shannon", the ultimate tear-jerking dead dog song. Boston buddies Bleu and Mike Viola take on "Baby Come Back" and "Steal Away", each of which sound exactly you'd hear them in your head singing these tracks, but I'll give Viola kudos for starting to sing "What a Fool Believes" at the end of "Steal Away", since the latter was pretty much a rip-off of the former.

Ironically there's no cover here of "Same Old Lang Syne", the Dan Fogelberg lite rock classic from which the title of the compilation derives. Curry has said it was on the list of songs submitted to the artists to cover, but nobody took it up. Hmmm...sounds like an opening for a Volume 2. The lack of Fogelberg notwithstanding, this is without doubt the best covers compilation since Not Lame's Right to Chews from 2002, which had power poppers covering early 70s' bubblegum classics, and it deserves to be highlighted outside the immediate power pop community.

CD Baby | iTunes | Bandcamp

Mike and Miles.

Mike Viola-Electro de Perfecto. Mike Viola needs little introduction for readers of this site. From his power pop band Candy Butchers to his work with Bleu (in LEO & The Major Labels) to a budding solo career, the one constant has been great pop songs. On his latest solo effort, Viola steps back a bit to create his most assured, mature recording to date while continuing to deliver the tunes. You might not realize this from the opener, the frenetic "Columbus Day Parade", but "Get You Back" (with Semisonic's Dan Wilson on harmony and FoW's Adam Schelsinger on bass) is magical midtempo pop, and "Soundtrack of My Summer" will be the soundtrack of your autumn with its clever, easygoing melody. Elsewhere, "Inside Out" is catchy as hell, and the closer "When the Stars Against You" is a wonderfully moody take on dealing with life's adversities. You probably don't need me to tell you to buy a Mike Viola album, but if you had the slightest hesitation my advice is to just do it.

iTunes

Miles Zuniga-These Ghosts Have Bones. It's hard to believe that this is Miles Zuniga's first proper solo album (although he did release a record in 2006 with his side project The Small Stars), but at long last the guy responsible for my most of my favorite Fastball tracks ("Fire Escape", "Airstream", "Mono to Stereo") gets the stage to himself. And These Ghosts Have Bones is worth the wait as Zuniga's pure popcraft is on full display. The Lennonesque opener "Marfa Moonlight" is wonderful, one of 2011's most unforgettable tracks and its lyrics are the source of the album title. "Rock Paper Scissors" is an excellent rocker that would have easily fit in on a Fastball record, while "Feel it in Your Kiss" displays a faint 70s R&B influence. Elsewhere, "Working on a Love Song" is a catchy number filled with irony (the writer of the song finishes it just in time to find its subject left him), and "Junkie Hands" finds Zuniga in a late-period Beatles state of mind. A great solo debut from one of my favorite pop songwriters, and a strong candidate for 2011's top 10.

iTunes

Freebie of the Year!

Bleu and Mike Viola are at it again. The last time they teamed up was for the L.E.O. project, and we all know what a success that was. Now they've joined forces as The Major Labels, and their disc Aquavia is available for free download at noisetrade.com if you give them three email addresses to pass on, or you can "pick a price" to pay for the download. (And to be ultra-helpful, I've included a widget for it in this post).

Like some other recent releases, this is as meta as it gets (the band title, many of the tracks), but that's OK. I don't need to get into a track-by-track thing, because it's Bleu. And it's Mike Viola. And it's not Gregorian chants or dissonant electronic music, it's the two of them in their pop milieu. And it's free. So why are you still reading this and not clicking below?