Review on Professor Wagstaff

As posted on jimberkin.wordpress.com

Oooooh yeah… give me more of that sweet creamy power pop goodness!

I heard a couple of cuts off this one via Little Steven’s Underground Garage radio show, and then checked out the band’s own website at TheRedButton.net where you can listen to riffs from every cut of this amazingly wonderful indy CD, accurately described by a reviewer on their site as the long lost album from a joint session of The Beatles & The Byrds circa 1965.

Though after listening to the entire album, I think they go beyond just the Beatles and Byrds. The two veteran popsters who comprise The Red Button, Seth Swirsky and Mike Ruekberg, evoke a variety of 1960s era pop stylings via jangly guitars, Farfisa organs, and melodic harmonies in song after song about, well what else are youg gonna sing about? Girls! Besides songs that will remind you of Help-Beatles VI era material from the fab four are other arrangements that conure up the sweetest sounds of The Lovin’ Spoonful, The Turtles and The Beach Boys… in other words, it’s all good news.

Click on the link and give it a listen! And look how there’s another reason to love the internet, when you can click that buy button and get your music directly from the artists themselves, depriving some nameless coke-tooting record company weasel of their undeserved cut!

Here’s to the day when every band can do this, when every film maker can do this, when every author can do this. Aren’t you fed up with money boys and gatekeeper pinheads making false assumptions about your personal tastes? I know I am. And it takes a lot for me to get fed up – ask anyone who has ever served me dessert.

Like I said, it’s all good. Nowadays there isn’t only a band in the garage, there’s also a webserver connected to Paypal. I think I like the 21st century.