The Association - Never My Love

Regular readers of this blog will know that I have a certain thing for Bubblegum Pop and its myriad sub-genres (Glam, Soft Pop etc.). However I have yet to write an entry on one of my favourites - Sunshine Pop; basically soft-pop with close harmonies a la The Beach Boys.

The de facto godfather of Sunshine Pop is Curt Boettcher, the songwriter/producer behind The Millennium, The Ballroom and Sagittarius. Boettcher produced the first album by The Association but this later track is my favourite from the six-piece multi-vocalist band.

Bonus clips: 'Never My Love' was the group's 3rd No. 1, the previous being 'Windy' which has been recently parodied in an ad for 7-Up featuring Brad Garrett. Here's a great live performance from 1967...

...'Never My Love' was written by The Addrisi Brothers who released their own discofied version on Buddah Records some ten years later in 1977.

Britney Spears - Womanizer

I have to admit that I completely missed this when it was first released. In fact, I heard it only recently on one of the playlists my wife made when I first bought her a MP3 player. Actually, it's great - and one of the handful of tracks I can actually stand to listen to on said playlist. Also, it's pretty amusing listening to the kids try and sing along with it (and the video has some, um, interesting visuals I guess)!

Bonus tracks: Similarly to 'Umbrella' & 'Crazy', 'Womanizer' has been covered by many other 'hip' artistes. Here's an acoustic take by Lily Allen...

... and a live-in-the-studio take by Franz Ferdinand...

... and finally here's Ellen with the two out of Fall Out Boy that anyone recognizes in one of her 'Bathroom Sessions'.