This is the third year in a row that the mighty Alpaca Sports have featured in the Unpopular advent, but the fact that their entries have appeared earlier each year is in no way a reflection of them slipping in my affection. In fact in many ways it is fitting that they kick off this year’s series because I really think of these advent listings as the ultimate year’s mix tape and you would be hard pushed to find any act better placed to kick off a mix than Alpaca Sports. Their infectious, bittersweet Pure Pop seems to come from a place both so naturally timeless and yet so utterly perfectly referenced and constructed. How better to illustrate this then than to showcase their ‘Just like Johnny Marr’ from the ‘Sealed With A Kiss’ LP from way back in February of this year. Of course ‘Sealed With A Kiss’ was less a ‘proper’ album and more a compilation of all their peerless and priceless sugar-coated singles with a few new songs tossed effortlessly into the mix. It was their ‘Singles Going Steady’; their ‘Different For Domeheads’ (stop scrabbling around collectors’ zips for the deleted original 7”s…) and none the worse for that. Indeed there is a strong argument to be made that says this is the perfect formula, for if ever there was a group custom built to celebrate the perfection of the 7” Pop single it is surely Alpaca Sports.
Alpaca Sports - 'Sealed With A Kiss' (Bandcamp, Amazon Download
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