Pop fans who are in the know are aware of David Grahame’s recent excellent contributions to indie pop music - 1998’s Toy Plane and 1999’s Beatle School Graduate Class of 1970. Proving that good things come in threes, the third superbly-crafted Grahame multi-track album, One Brick Short , has just hit the streets and it picks up where its predecessors left off - with another brilliant collection of McCartneyesque pop tunes.

To put it succinctly, another position in this year’s Top Ten Albums list has just been taken! “Positive” gets things rolling with a jangly McCartney-type tune; “Camera” follows and merits comparisons with Harry Nillson’s repertoire. “Flower Petal” employs some George Harrison-inspired jangle and song elements. “Again Again” could be mistaken for a classic McCartney/Lennon tune, and “Loving You Love” is a ballad that also features Grahame’s wife, Cynthia, on backing vocals. “Church” features jangle and harmony; “Steady Thing 2” augments its chiming guitars with handclaps. “Perfect Pop Song” fuses Byrds, Who and Beatles influences in an upbeat tune with some lyrics that lament the demise of the Fab Four. “Album” closes the ten-song effort (which clocks in at just over 30 minutes) with an acoustic ballad that implies that this may be David’s “last album for a while.” Let’s hope not.

Like Toy Plane and Beatles School Graduate Class of 1970, One Brick Short is a “perfect pop album” and it provides further evidence that David Grahame is in a league of his own. Fufkin website readers should note that Alan Haber (who terminated his “Pure Pop” website and INTERNET radio program last year) is once again the Executive Producer of this Grahame album. In my view, Alan, the trade-off was worth it! This disc is available from Dog Turner Records at cut1ie@aol.com

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David Grahame
The Power Station Sessions 1982-1986

(Dog Turner)

I am now convinced that if the record industry wanted to ask one artist to record a “Best of the 80s” compilation disc, that artist should be David Grahame. In fact, music fans who listen to The Power Station Sessions 1982-1986 will probably be convinced that they have heard some of the featured songs before on the radio, on television or in a movie. But they haven’t … until now! Grahame, with three excellent recent pop albums to his credit, has done us all a favor by releasing songs that he recorded in the mid-80s at the Power Station in New York City with a revolving group of well-known period artists (e.g., Ian Hunter, Corky Laing, Tommy Shaw) and engineers.

Although it is hard for Grahame and these songs to escape comparisons with Paul McCartney and mid-80s Wings, comparisons with other 80s artists are well-deserved. The eighteen tracks will remind seasoned 80s listeners of John Waite and the Babys, early Bryan Adams, the Ravyns, Kenny Loggins, the Cars and Benjamin Orr, Translator, the Pretenders, Dwight Twilley, Paul Collins’ band the Beat, Jeff Lynne and ELO, Mike and the Mechanics, Tommy Tutone, Rick Springfield, Survivor, Tears For Fears, the Alan Parsons Project … just to name a few.

The organ-driven ballad “Twenty Days” even sounds like it may have borrowed the Band Aid (“We Are The World”) ensemble for its chorus vocals. “Partners In Time” could be a mid-tempo jangly folk-rock tune by the Red Rockers. “Complete My Dream” sounds like it could have been a Paul McCartney/Dan Fogelberg/Tom Petty collaboration. “Maybe Some Other Night” and “Louise” could be mistaken for out-takes from Wings recording sessions. The piano-driven “I’ll Die Trying” emulates Randy Newman and Billy Joel musical styles, and “Hurdles” finishes things with a jangly tune that is quite reminiscent of the Records. The songs employ the production and guitar-oriented techniques of that era, and every song emerges as an original gem … and a definite glimpse of the direction that Grahame’s future pop songwriting would take. Fans of 80s pop/rock will drool over this collection. What are you waiting for? Put on your skinny tie and crank up the speakers! The disc is available from Dog Turner Records at cut1ie@aol.com

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