DESCRIPTION:
Doug Powell's 1998 album. Released by Not Lame Recordings, 1998. No Copyright Intended.

Genres: Power Pop, Pop Rock

---Tracklist---
1. Let It Rock - 0:00
2. When She Awoke - 4:18
3. Just Like Montogomery Clift - 8:55
4. Humouresque - 13:16
5. Torn - 18:00
6. Don't Say - 22:29
7. Graceland - 27:03
8. Cross My Heart - 31:52
9. A Man For All Seasons - 36:18
10. Can't Break My Heart - 40:30
11. Are You Listening Betty Flowers? - 44:41
12. For The Love Of God - 48:46
13. Goodnight - 53:41

---Personnel---
Doug Powell - Composer, Design, Layout Design, Liner Notes, Performer, Photography, Primary Artist, Producer
Steve Allen - Bass
Dave Perkins - Bass, Producer
Tom Petersson - Bass, Composer
Dave Powell - Drums
Todd Cooper - Composer
Alan Arnold - Artwork, Cover Illustration

---Biography---

A protégé of Todd Rundgren, Doug Powell is a more straightforward musician than his muse, more along the lines of XTC's Andy Partridge. Like Rundgren, Powell had a run of bad luck with record companies early in his career, but it's easier to carve out a place for oneself away from the major labels than it was in the late '60s and early '70s, so Powell has been able to find a ready audience in the American power pop underground.

Raised in Oklahoma, the son of a physicist and a professional flutist, Powell grew up as a fan of XTC, Rundgren, and Jules Shear, whom he approached at a solo gig in Chicago with a home-recorded tape of 22 songs. Taken with his young fan's work, Shear shopped the tape around to various labels and produced a more professional demo that landed the young singer/songwriter a development deal with Elektra Records. The A&R executive at Elektra who liked Powell's songs then ended up at RCA, for whom Powell recorded his first album, Ballad of the Tin Men. Unfortunately, by the time the album was ready, the A&R executive had jumped ship to Mercury Records, which finally released the finished album in 1996 just as Powell's mentor was fired by an incoming label president, immediately stopping the album in its tracks.

By this time, Powell had met and toured with Todd Rundgren, who agreed to produce his second album. After Mercury rejected the demos for the album and dropped Powell, the singer/songwriter (who had settled in Nashville by this time) placed one of the rejected songs, "Torn," on Nashpop: A Nashville Pop Compilation, a local scene compilation released by the Colorado-based label Not Lame Records, which then released the entire set of rejected demos as 1998's Curiouser.

The talented Doug Powell handles multiple instruments and technical aspects, but more importantly writes simple pop songs. For Curiouser, Powell recorded "flaws and warts" onto an eight track and released the raw product in an attempt to emulate the freshness and excitement of spontaneity and creation. Surprisingly, Curiouser is not raucous or noisy, but a solid pop record. The sound is fine and the songs are well-structured enough to avoid that demo rip-off feeling. If the liner notes didn't indicate the rudiments of this experiment, none would be the wiser. Of course the project reeks of evil-genius Todd Rundgren, but the tunes are unmistakably Powell's. "Just Like Montgomery Cliff" shares a strange celebrity fascination with the Clash. Powell's former Nashville neighbor, Cheap Trick's Tom Petersson, helps out on "When She Awoke" (later laid down with the rest of Swag). The great piece "Torn" also graces the excellent Nashpop collection. "Cross My Heart" exudes pure obsessive romanticism: paralyzing and fascinating. Sometimes Powell's forlorn feeling recalls Freedy Johnston, but with better vocals. Curiouser actually gets better as it rolls. Don't see Doug Powell shooting up the charts, and of course he deserves much more credit than he'll ever get, but, in a perfect world, he rides the top of the pops.