I wish my college radio station was well-stocked with Big Star records, but that was sadly not the case. Instead, I often had to settle for their descendants, those happy few who were doing their best to carry forward the banner of power pop. There were few things that got me immediately excited quite like big, buzzing guitars propping up ridiculously catchy hooks. Similarly, when power pop bands turned to ballads–the emotions were the part of the song turned up to eleven–they were crafting exactly the sorts of songs that I wanted when I was doing the late night shift and the clock ticked over to the 1:00 a.m. hour. Unfortunately, most of those albums didn’t have staying power for me. For whatever reason, they tended to fade from the memory. One of the major exceptions was Teenage Symphonies to God, by Velvet Crush.

First of all, there was the utterly irresistible detail that the album title was taken from Brian Wilson’s initial description of the legendary and long-unreleased Pet Sounds follow-up Smile. Then there was the involvement of Matthew Sweet as producer. Sweet was still riding high from his 1991 album, Girlfriend (and still above the clouds but dipping in altitude somewhat following 1993’s Altered Beast), and the sterling sensibility he brought to his own work came through on the Velvet Crush record. The whole release seemed to dispense to musical contents of the 45 tote of my dreams. I was a graduate when the album came out, but I was still volunteering at the radio station. Shift by shift, I tracked through the album, enamored anew with each new song.

Any of the songs could be shared here and call back to a moment when my heart went ping. But, as I noted above, I’m especially partial to the ballads, probably because of obligation to champion anything that calls to mind Big Star’s “Thirteen.” So the link above, which could have been any number of tracks, is “Faster Days.”

Listen or download –> Velvet Crush, “Faster Days”

(Disclaimer: It appears to me that Velvet Crush’s Teenage Symphonies to God is out of print as a physical object that can be obtained from your favorite local, independently-owned record store. It can be bought digitally, but we all know that doesn’t count. That said, I specifically use the word “appears” up there, since I’ve examined this particular release many times before and always determined that it didn’t meet the “out of print” criterion for this feature. Anyway, I will gladly remove it from the internet if asked to do so by someone with authority to make such a request.)