Nite Songs

  "Open the door and let the light in..."  - Silver Sun -   Golden Skin , 1996 On October 30th, I received some news which hit hard - James Broad, frontman with one of my favourite bands from my late teenage years Silver Sun, had passed away following a battle with cancer. At the time I was midway through writing an earlier SFTJ column about Mega City Four and reflecting on how Wiz's passing in 2006 came as such a shock to me so to hear this news definitely felt a bit eerie. Fast forward three months or so and as I'm midway through writing this SFTJ column about Silver Sun, I received the horrible news that Mark Keds, frontman with the Senseless Things ( who I've also covered on SFTJ in the past and were one of the first guitar bands I got into - Mark was also the catalyst for me discovering the Wildhearts and starting my lifelong fandom of them when he briefly joined the group after the Things split up) had suddenly passed away. Again, this has been a real shoc...

  Getting close to the top of the chart now as we enter the alliteratively alluring Nite Songs' Top 20 albums of 2020. Some crackers in here and no mistake. 20. SPARKS - "A Steady Drip Drip Drip" ( Review ) Scary to think that Sparks are now almost half a century into their careers. And scarier still that they're still putting out albums as great as A Steady Drip Drip Drip  way after most of their contemporaries had given up the creative ghost. Taking in the group's formative glam stomp as well as excursions into everything from samba rhythms to music hall stylings to pure pop, this is just as much of a joy to listen to as ever. Great stuff. *** 19. DIABLOFURS - "Neon Satellites" ( Review ) With controls firmly set to the new wave era of the early '80s. Nottingham glitter merchants Diablofurs came up with one of the best debut albums of 2020 mixing Tubeway Army style electronica with pure power-pop sensibilities to great effect on tunes like Rival Gr...

  Ah the memories. Silver Sun were the great should've-been band of the mid-'90s. Taking the '70s Cheap Trick style power-pop formula and giving it a liberal dose of Britrock meatiness, they should have in an ideal world coasted to Top 20 stardom in the wake of the Wildhearts and Terrorvision, both of whom they definitely owed a sly debt in their sound to (although with their own spin on the formula obviously). Instead, they were lumped in with Britpop whose retro footy shirt clad laddishness never really suited them, and when that ship went down in 1998 or so they quickly found themselves sunk. They never officially split up though and frontman James Broad has continued to put releases out under the Silver Sun name with various collaborators old and new in the 20 years since with Switzerland  being their sixth album no less. It kicks off in fine style too with Earth Girls Are Easy  (a tribute to the cornball '80s musical film of the same name) sounding like some great ...