The Crystal Set - Benefit of the Doubt

The Crystal Set were an Australian band of the late 1980s/early 1990s, led by Russell Kilbey. His voice was a lot like his brother Steve's and their music was pretty similar to the Church's, too. Good stuff but nothing terribly special.

This was an early single and track from their debut album, From Now On.

Buffalo Tom - Birdbrain

American indie rock in the Dinosaur Jr vein (J Mascis was their co-producer). I'm not too much of a fan of this genre but their early albums had a few catchy tunes each. This was the title track from the second one.

Woods - Death Rattle

Here's an absolutely gorgeous little tune from Woods, one of the many reasons to wish I was living in Brooklyn again. It's from their album At Echo Lake, released earlier this year.

10,000 Maniacs - Scorpio Rising

Here's a track from 10,000 Maniacs' second album, 1985's The Wishing Chair. I didn't think much of the rest of that album, nor anything they released after it. But this was one cracking tune.

I distinctly recall seeing a proper video for this many years ago (with Natalie Merchant doing her best whirling dervish imitation), but I can't seem to find it anywhere now.

Ride - Polar Bear

Here's a really wonderful one from Ride's full-length debut, Nowhere. Lyrics (well, some of them anyway) courtesy of JD Salinger.

By an odd coincidence, the Charlatans' debut album which came out at almost exactly the same time also had a song with this title. It wasn't nearly as good though.

Velocity Girl - Forgotten Favorite

An early(ish) Velocity Girl track, after they replaced Bridget Cross with Sarah Shannon on vocals but before they shed the heavy shoegaze influence. It's very Charlottes but with muddier vocals - sounds a bit dated now but that wonderfully catchy chorus still has the kind of pure pop melody that never gets old.

Actually, I think when they did drop the shoegaze stuff and became more or less a straight pop band, they weren't nearly as interesting. But maybe that's just me.

Tullycraft - Falling Out of Love (With You)

There are a few sort of classic indiepop bands that I'm just not really a big fan of. Tullycraft are one of them. My first problem with them is the vocals, which always rubbed me the wrong way. My second problem is that I think they were really just a lo-fi Weezer with a better record collection. So I just never really saw the attraction.

They did, however, do an absolutely lovely version of this Stephen Merritt tune, and for that they deserve unqualified praise. And a blog post.