The Lift - Nearly Gear! (1985, Roo)

Hailing from the not oft spoken locale of Newport News, VA, The Lift weave some intermittent magic across the dozen song (and one stray chord) Nearly Gear!  The album jacket suggests this trio might be of rockabilly stock, but to far greater delight they apply a bevy of advanced maneuvers within our sometimes routine left-of-the-dial environs.  I say intermittent in the respect that the Lift have a tendency to diverge from song to song, resembling a cornucopia of their contemporaries.  The band light the pleasure sensors ablaze on "Plush With Blonde" and "Monetary Means," emanating the stripe of creative juices Matthew Sweet did with his early Buzz of Delight endeavor, and ditto for such oddly alluring combos from Wilfully Obscure's back pages like Cannon Heath Down and Square Root of Now.  Something Fierce comes to mind as well.  When the Lift shift into peak performance, Nearly Gear! resembles some sort of long lost Mitch Easter production credit.  Elsewhere, we're allotted a par excellence serving of power pop in the guise of  "Good Head," and "This Is Bad's" Johnny Marr inflected jangle is nearly as sublime.  Despite some demonstrable inconsistencies this record still manages to border on a revelation.

BTW, Lift fulcrum Bryan Forrest has a Reverbnation page featuring music from a variety of his endeavors, including the one I just introduced you to.  Well worth exploring.  

01. Nothing Sacred
02. Fair Airplane
03. Plush With Blonde
04. Monetary Means
05. To Have and to Hold
06. Shift the Edge
07. This of That
08. This is Bad
09. Swayed (Scottish Mix)
10. She Gets By
11. Good Head
12. Must I?
13. Paul's Lost Really Gear Chord

Hear