Song of the Month Week!: What About Us

Well, I must say I'm proud of how long I held out posting only two songs per month ... but I don't think I can hold myself back any longer. Mind you, I won't be going hog wild and posting a song every day (mainly 'cause I still stand behind most of what I said here), but I think that one MP3 per week is a healthy dose, and one I shouldn't have any trouble holding myself to. You'll never know what each week's download is gonna be -- usually one of my current/recent favorites, but I'll continue bringing you an Audio Train Wreck every once in awhile, and maybe even a miscellaneous gem, like an oldie or a novelty recording. But rest assured, if your pal Thnairg bothers to upload it, it's worth listening to at least once.


"What About Us"
Point Break
from the album "Apocadelic" (Warner/UK, 2000)

Point Break were a three-member boyband from the UK who, unfortunately, only ever released one album. True, there were dozens of boybands flooding the market at that time, but while all the other boybands were concentrating on the two ends of the boy-pop spectrum -- high-energy dance tracks and slow, sweet love songs -- Point Break picked up on the virtually untouched sub-genre in the middle: the power ballad.

Sure, they had their share of dance numbers too, but they obviously realized they were good at power ballads, 'cause there are several on the album. This is my favorite of them ... it starts out quietly, like any unassuming soft ballad, but when the chorus thunders in, with that percussion track that was made to sound like a stadium full of people stomping and clapping in unison, it makes the hairs stand up on the back of your neck.

I'm not sure if any of the Point Break boys went on to bigger and better things in the music industry (heck, I don't even know their full names), but it's a shame they never put out a second album, because I've almost invariably found boybands' sophomore albums -- where they really began to develop their own sound -- superior to their debuts. And since they had already stood a bit apart from the pack on their first record, I can only imagine the great album that never was.