The Salvation Army "Mind Gardens" (New Alliance)

Around Black Friday last year (2018 - yikes!) I saw a bunch of Stateside folks posting the cover art of an lp featuring The Dream Syndicate, The Bangles, Rain Parade and The Three O'Clock covering each other's songs. Hopefully, it'll show up at some point in UK-based record shops (there's no way I'm handing over next month's pay cheque to the US Postal Service to get a double lp sent across the Atlantic) as the concept behind it is sound. Reading the name The Three O'Clock again gave me the wee jolt I needed to finally pick up a copy of the sole 7" by that group''s precursor, The Salvation Army. "Mind Gardens" (New Alliance, 1981) zips along at skatepunk speed while Michael Quercio, masquerading as Ricky Start, sings in a cute, interestingly-accented manner (the way he sings is 'goes' and 'grows' is so endearing!). I love it for all the same reasons I love early Redd Kross or that first lp by The Descendents. 

The surprisingly poignant b-side is equally great and possibly even more sing-along-able:

Bleached vs. Nikki & The Corvettes

Succinct pop, that's all I crave these days. Make it a little punky, too, and I'm doubly likely to lap it up. Bleached do the succinct/punky thing beautifully on their forthcoming single "Next Stop" (Dead Oceans):

Three decades ago Nikki and The Corvettes pulled off the same trick on "You Make Me Crazy" from their debut lp:

It's a total smash and grab head-spinner whose guitars are that little bit crisper than those on "Next Stop" and all the better for it. Mind you, it doesn't have that song's tremendous backing vocals. Whatever, both tunes have the desired effects (pogoing, brain-emptying etc.) and I'm pretty sure that I made a coupla new squeaky floorboards as I bounced around to them earlier.