By Alan Haber – Pure Pop Radio
Wes Hollywood | Dynamite (Kool Kat, 2019)
From Chicago to your town, Wes Hollywood’s Kool Kat CD debut hits the ground running with a fun, zippy mix of tunes saluting the sounds of early Elvis Costello, Dave Edmunds, and sixties British Invasion bands. Two guitars, bass and drums rule here.
From track to track, all relatively short, you never know where you’re going to land even as guitars are the primary ingredient. “Dirty Manhattan” is loud, speedy, and in-your-face; “Nothing to See Here” is an uptempo number with a melodic bass line; “Evelyn” is pure, early Elvis C., with a surprising blink-and-you’ll-miss-it quiet bridge–just Wes and guitar–towards the end.
Hollywood ups the ante with songs like “Fall Up a Ladder,” a mid-paced ballad that manages to reference the Kinks and Squeeze and slip in a waltz tempo that increases in intensity with a minute to go. “Dandelion” sounds for all the world like a mix of early Elvis Costello and British Invasion moxie. But it’s the straight-ahead pure pop of the closer (with a Stiff Records cold ending), “No One Loves You,” that neatly pleases this reviewer’s heart the most. It’s a catchy two-and-a-half minute earworm, for sure.
Wes Hollywood’s Dynamite, brought to life by Wes (guitar and vocals), guitarist Pete Javier, bassist Spencer Matern, and drummer and vocalist Tom Shover, is pure dynamite.
Where to Get It: Kool Kat Musik
∴
Yorick van Norden | The Jester (Excelsior, 2018)
Yorick van Norden’s miraculous album is a strong gathering of melody-rich songs crafted with care by a songwriter who possesses a keen sense of melodic structure.
Hailing from the Netherlands, van Norden is clearly influenced by some of the top melodic stylists of the rock and pop eras. This sophomore release (his debut, Happy Hunting Ground, came out in 2015) makes a strong statement, and is proof positive that melody continues to be king.
The Jester’s opener, the psych-drenched “The Forest of the Mind,” echoes the sensibilities exhibited in similar-sounding work by XTC and the Big Dish. The jaunty, jangly “Another Day in London Town” and “More than Words” sound as if they could have been plucked from the fertile song wells of any number of 1960s British Invasion stars. Yet, they are uniquely van Norden.
Van Norden’s ballads are as inviting as his more upbeat numbers. “Suite No. 1,” a gorgeous, orchestrated flight of fancy, is a pure pop masterwork, a very affecting, enlightened construct. “Winter,” with its Four Freshmen-like harmonies and Beach Boys and Association sensibilities, is a waking dream of a tune, an instant classic. And “Light Up Love,” which sounds like a close cousin of Paul McCartney’s “Put It There,” marries lovely harmonies with a strong melody and a plucking bass-as-percussion bottom.
The shining light that closes van Norden’s sophomore journey, “Suite No. 2,” is a seven-and-a-half minute coming together of song sections clearly influenced by classic, melodically-centered artists such as Harry Nilsson, Emitt Rhodes, and the aforementioned McCartney. It is a stunning offering that closes with a softened instrumental explosion of themes and feeling, one that paints the soundfield with traditional pop and rock instrumentation, orchestration and heart.
With melody as its heart, Van Norden’s The Jester is a shining example of the best that melodic pop has to offer.
Where to Get It: Amazon, iTunes
Alan Haber’s Pure Pop Radio is the premiere website covering the melodic pop scene with in-depth reviews of new and reissued recordings, and a wide variety of features. We’ve been around since the first weekly Pure Pop Radio shows, which began broadcasting in 1995, and the 24-hour Pure Pop Radio station, which ended last August.
Welcome to your number one home for coverage of the greatest melodic pop music in the universe from the ’60s to today.
What I know about Everet Almond I could fit literally on the head of a pin and still have room left for a whole lot more; he’s played drums and percussion with Bryan Scary in Evil Arrows and self-released a number of download-only EPs under the Almond name and as Windsor Field.
The first Kool Kat collection, titled An Introduction to Everet Almond, collects the artist’s first three EPs, originally recorded and released digitally from January 2015 to February 2018: Four Track(s), Left of Center, and Everet Almond Three.
Before adopting the Everet Almond moniker, Almond recorded as Windsor Field; these tracks, now released on Kool Kat as being by Almond in a collection called Windsor Field, catapult the artist’s sound into the pop stratosphere. They are full-fidelity recordings of assured compositions performed with a boatload of gusto.
Almond’s full-length, self-titled collection, the third in Kool Kat’s series and the first release recorded as a full-length, is a joyous listen from start to finish; ears will perk up to the catchy pure popper “I Love You,” courting a delicious melody and joyous harmonies, and, by contrast, the upbeat, guitar-based, harmony-laden pop-rocker “Don’t You Need Me?”. The ultra-poppy “Beautiful Neighbor” boasts all of Almond’s strengths, not the least of which is the song’s rich harmony component and a particularly clever, pumping piano part.
Where to Get It: All at Kool Kat Musik’s Online Pop Catalog Store: 
Just one month shy of a year since the release of Whimsicality, Ray Paul’s glorious, rock ’em, sock ’em return to recording, which in July of 2016 we called “one of this year’s best albums… a delicious mix of originals and well-chosen covers,” Ray returns with another, so-very-catchy slice of pop, and it’s a doozy.
Now playing on Pure Pop Radio
We’re also excited to exclusively be bringing you, for the next two weeks, the world radio premieres of two tracks from The Greek Theatre’s smashing, forthcoming first-time CD release of their album Broken Circle on Kool Kat Musik. Previously released on vinyl in a limited edition by Sugarbush Records, Broken Circle is a mind-tripping, mesmerizing melange of psychedelia and melodic substance.
