MITCH GRIER
Arts Writer

While being interviewed some time in the mid ’60s, Pete Townsend of the Who coined the term “power pop.”

He was trying to describe his band’s sound: a shotgun marriage of raucous guitar clang and sweet flowing melody (see “Pictures of Lily”). Townsend and the Who drifted away from the simple pop song format but still a genre was born.

By the time the decade rolled over, bands like Badfinger and the Raspberries were working wonders within this newly named genre. None had more promise or future impact than the Memphis-based foursome Big Star.

Big Star came about when Alex Chilton quit his big-money gig with The Box Tops to join up with the Chris Bell-fronted Rock City. Along with bassist Andy Hummel and drummer Jody Stevens, the band came together to fill out Bell’s synthesis of the British invasion sound and homegrown influences like Chuck Berry and American soul (after all, their base of Memphis was home to Stax records). With Bell working as a recording engineer for Ardent records, Big Star was able to get studio time quite easily.

In 1972, the group gave their first effort the ambitious title of #1 Record. It fully showcased the band’s influences as well as the blossoming songwriting of both Bell and Chilton. “Thirteen” and “In the Street” were to become favourites but, despite the album’s apparent hit power, it failed to make an impact. The loss devastated Bell, who had considered the project his life’s work. He quit the band before the release of their second effort, Radio City, claiming he wanted nothing to do with the upcoming record, or Big Star, anymore.

Much like the first record, Radio City was loaded with hit potential. “September Gurls,” the album’s cult classic, chimes with the Byrds’ jangle and Chilton’s melancholy croon. This sweet pop sound was countered with a ragged heaviness heard in tracks like “Mod Lang” and “She’s a Mover.”

Their third record was a messy mixture of studio experimentation and loose songwriting. It was later given the name Third/Sister Lovers (Chilton and Stevens were dating sisters at the time). Throughout the album, Chilton toys with feedback overtop of acoustic ballads with Stevens crashing through Keith Moon’s school of drum bashing. This cacophonous beauty appears in tracks like “Kangaroo” and the haunting “Holocaust.”

Big Star’s influence has been immense. Many critics have dubbed Big Star the second most influential cult band trailing only Lou Reed’s Velvet Underground.

Big Star echoes through popular music and is championed by Cheap Trick, The Replacements, Teenage Fanclub, R.E.M., Wilco and many others (the Bangles even recorded a version of “September Gurls”).