Thank You Friends: An Almost There Records Salute to Big Star

Thank You Friends: An Almost There Records Salute to Big Star

Given our town's penchant for loud guitars jangling toward beer-light transcendence, it's a wonder no one thought to do a Big Star tribute until 2008. Thank You Friends remedies this with 13 solid to stellar paeans to the Memphis-bred power-pop pioneers. The Service Industry's "You Can't Have Me" emphasizes the song's quintessential pop bones by stripping away the sax, sweetening the harmonies, and battening down the groove. Glossary's "Don't Lie to Me" is the kind of exhilarating, rough-and-tumble cover every act worth its salt should be able to muster at closing time. Grand Champeen and Moonlight Towers assert their barroom stripes on "Daisy Glaze" and "September Gurls," while Beaty Wilson and the Archibalds tackle Big Star's heart-heavy flip side with their respective takes on "The Ballad of El Goodo" and "O, Dana." While stabs at "Thirteen" and "In the Street" would've been nice, the album's encapsulation of Big Star's charms is full-grown without them.