A quick look at what used copies of their CDs are going for on Amazon.com suggests the esteem in which this band is held by the few who managed to hear them, and it's no wonder; Kontiki is simply one of the handful of best pop records of the 90s. The ability of Robert Harrison to juxtapose great pop rock in the Beatles/Byrds tradition with strange psychedelic experiments that actually still hold together as tunes (something that bands like Olivia Tremor Control were NEVER able to pull off) is a rare gift, as is his ability to throw out damaged and achy love songs that recall Big Star's Sister Lovers. Something like Guided by Voices (of whom Harrison was a huge fan) with an attention span and an ability to distinguish their best ideas from their merely mediocre ones, they shared a similar lo-fi aesthetic, but where Guided By Voices' studio austerity sometimes seemed forced (Alien Lanes), Cotton Mather's seemed ingenious. A previous LP, Cotton Is King, had an inappropriate commercial sheen that took the edge off some pretty good material, as well as some truly horrible amateur alterna-indie artwork that would have discouraged most people who like their later records from ever picking it up. A later LP, The Big Picture, was nearly as glorious as Kontiki. Kontiki will be re-issued in the year 2013, after some advertising executive that used to be a college radio DJ places one of their songs in a commercial for whatever that year's new technology that encourages people to have loud, embarrassing conversations in public is going to be.

Perhaps they were actually trying to buy in to the then-current power pop trend. Perhaps it's a case of blind pigs and their occasional truffles. For whatever reason, Blue, a band almost completely devoid of punk-rock influences deliver a Little Hit on this single from a lackluster 1979 LP, Fools Party. The Rocket Record company is, of course, Elton John's label, which would explain his production credit. While they were mostly a tame, ultra-professional rock band with about as much edge as Firefall, Blue's output does have it's moments. Their self-titled US LP on RSO is available in used record stores nationwide for around $5, and is very nice Badfinger-esque pop; a 1982 UK 45, "Don't Wanna Make You Cry" has many of the same charms as "Danger Sign."

Ah...pathos. Where would pop music be without it? And the only thing better than pathos is pathos with loud guitars. Here's a stupid story about a guy who is such an ineffectual dweeb that he loses his girlfriend to a horse. But the singer totally sells it, lumpy English and all; the moment before the last chorus where all the instruments drop out behind the vocals is heart-stopping. I first heard this on a sampler CD of various Swedish bands, then picked up the cheekily-titled Rubber Soul CD via Not Lame (whose CEO, Bruce Brodeen was the chief US champion of Swedish pop acts like TPD, Beagle, The Wannadies and Eggstone that emerged in the 90s), but the former is ugly and the latter has gone lost so no picture, just perfect pop.

By the way, speaking of Swedish bands, I saw Soundtrack Of Our Lives last night. If there is a better live rock band in the world, I sure wish they'd stop by.

One of the most confounding, inexplicable bands of our age. Idiot-savant history professors with an abiding love of the Beatles. Ferocious velocities, keening harmonies, and what they hell are they going on about now? Their debut LP, Strum and Drum is almost certainly in your home, isn't it? The Sex Clark Five continue to take military strategy and Merseybeat into space; I'm sure they'll tell us all about it the next time they're in the neighborhood. Genius.

Jim Basnight is revered by power pop fans for his work with the Moberlys and Rockinghams. He is afforded some cred by lovers of Killed By Death-Style punk for his 1977 B-side "She Got Fucked." He is ignored by virtually everybody else. His biggest Little Hit would be the wonderful "I Want To Be Yours" single from 1983, but we've gone even deeper in the realm of the obscure to bring you this track from a Seattle compilation LP, where Basnight appears alongside bands like The Fastbacks, Pudz and Fartz.