Today, as must happen from time to time, this space is turned over to a song–and, by extension, the primary knowledge I have of said song and the artist attached to it–that I originally discovered of the first true treasure trove of hidden musical wonders that I found out there among the twists of the information superhighway. I spent weeks tracking through the entirety of the now-defunct Little Hits blog, stocking my iTunes with the catchy, joyous, punky and perfect obscurities that were shared there. It was like discovering a funhouse mirror version of my beloved 90FM C Stacks (the repository for all the least-known albums in the station’s library): stocked with great material that was recognizably part of the same era as all my favorites, but largely comprised of material that I had little to now familiarity with. I was able to build a virtual playlist from the alternate universe versions of my late night radio shows of the past.

I’ve now had those songs I downloaded rattling around in my various shuffles for so long that, like the bygone “90FM hits” that dominated at our station and practically nowhere else, I can sometimes forget that the various tracks are practically unknown. As the title of the blog implied, most of them sound like hits. “When You’re Young” is a track of the band’s 1979 album, Big City Rock. It evidently garnered some healthy radio airplay in the band’s hometown of Boston, but failed to expand elsewhere, despite the backing of a major label. It’s a fabulous power pop song, simply stranded in a timeline in which Big Star are cult heroes instead of the standard bearers for a fleet of major acts following to great success.

As usual when I used a Little Hits song, I’ll direct you to the original post for more information or maybe just the game of trying to glean what exactly was in the write-up that made me excitedly grab the song in the first place. The actual tracks that were posted on Little Hits are long gone, but that’s what the prompt directly below is for.

Listen or download –> The Atlantics, “When You’re Young”

(Disclaimer: It’s hard to even find much about this album by the Atlantics online. Amazon, for example, is convinced that I’m really trying to find out about the self-titled album from the band that evidently took their name from the Atlantics release. In a nice bit of symmetry, their album is on Atlantic Records. Through all that confusion, I remain convinced that the Atlantics album is fully, completely, and perhaps irrevocably out of print. It’s certainly unlikely that you or I would be able to cross the threshold of our favorite local, independently-owned record store and procure a physical copy of it in a manner that duly compensates both the proprietor of said store and the recording artist. It is with the understanding, therefore, that I am impeding no fair commerce that I share the track here. I will gladly remove it if asked to do so by an individual or entity with due authority to make such a request.)