A welcome return of the Pop Monster. Greg Pope is beloved here in what has been a prolific solo career in the last decade. This is his eighth album in that period and you always know that you are going to get Power Pop Excellence before you open the tin.
You can read my review of Guiding Star here and Fan Boy here. The harmonies and riffs are always present, as is that laid back mellow joy of a voice, but there's always more, adventures into the left field, variation or the pure unexpected.
With A Few Seconds Of Fame, there are far more of those unexpected pleasures and although the Power Pop stamp is still present, this album is more of a move into Pop Rock. The arrangements are bigger, the solos are filled out, it all works beautifully.
The 12 songs are book ended by Forget About You and You Got Inside My Head, both are more traditional Greg Pope poptastic, as though they are reminding you of what default is. The latter, in particular, has a blistering Guitar Solo.
The drums and especially Bass Riffs are far more prominent. She's Already There is encased in a real Prog feel, it works so well. The song gets a Part 2 as the penultimate track, but this time in as an acoustic vocal extravaganza.Hopes And Dreams And Fears is classic 70's Pop Rock, think John Miles, even more so with the solo. There's a splendid tempo change partt way through.
Planet Earth is a sort of Classical Rock. Greg's Son, Micah Pope plays harpsichord and Pope himself, goes all Ritchie Blackmore in the Guitar accompaniment, all this surrounds a melodic winner of a song. Compare all the arrangements in that to the simplicity of Give You What You Want, which is a real vent. build around a fine Bass Run.
A Few Seconds Of Fame is a superb album in a superb year. It gives you just enough of what you'd want from a Greg Pope album, but stretches out far more than on previous albums. It's going to be high in people's end of year charts and rightly so. It's highly recommended.
You can listen to and buy the album here.
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