The Wigs: File Under: Pop Vocal (2009)
File under pop heaven. I’m always interested in power pop reissues and therefore I picked this up from notlame.com. The Wigs was a Milwaukee-based power pop band and their only album File Under: Pop Vocal came out in 1981. It’s strong and catchy skinny-tied power pop album. Especially the first four songs are pure gold. After listening to a song like 180 Degree or Tell It All one needs a forklift to pick up his jaw from the floor and keeps thinking “what the hell was that pure pop bliss” and “why the hell I hadn’t heard that one before”. Just fantastic late seventies power pop and the vocals are just magical. After the first four songs, everything remains enjoyable but the quality does drop a tiny bit. Not much, but it doesn’t reach the same heavenly heights anymore. I think this is mostly because it gets a lot closer to basic rock’n’roll. Nothing really wrong with that, but I just think that there are better rock bands out there. They couldn’t get even get close to that angelic pop bliss that The Wigs provided in the early stages of the album, but in their own game they are unbeatable. Therefore Popular Girl and It’s Over are the only ones that match the perfectness of the starting quartet during the later stages of the album. However, these six songs are so freakin’ good and could be compared to any pop classic of the era that it makes this a must have album. A minor complaint about the simple packaging and lack of liner notes, but in the end it doesn’t really matter. What matters is that these wonderful pop tunes are out and available on CD for the first time.
