Middle States—Happy Fun Party (Effen Records)
“You think you can push me around/but you can’t do that to me/I’m in charge,” Wes Morden declares on “In Charge,” the catchy opener to Middle States’ full-length power pop debut. You know it’s mostly musical defiance, of course, but that’s what gives it power: The Man may in fact push you around all day, but in these two- and three-minutes bursts of Rickenbacker jangle and rapid barre-chord changes, pulsing bass-lines and metronomic drums, embittered narratives and bursts of spastic lead guitar, nobody messes with you. It’s power pop’s aesthetic writ large: Punk-ish release from suburban monotony, minus punk’s menace and anti-melody agenda. Middle States tap a wealth of rock-solid inspiration: the jacked-up Big Star opener, Robert Pollard fronting “Eight Miles High” Byrds on “Winds of Eidertown,” the bilious Graham Parker/Nirvana mash-up “Thought Control,” and the wistful “Tumbleweeds,” which reads like an homage to fellow Twin Cities mainstream-rejects The Replacements. One or two songs may not measure up with the rest, but when Middle States hit all their marks—most notably on the cathartic, cuttin’ loose-at-a-weekend-gig anthem “Friday Night”—the life-blood appeal of power pop is as clear as it was in the hands of its most famous advocates. (John Schacht)
http://www.ieweekly.com/cms/story/detail/the_weekly_jive/1981/