{"id":27234,"date":"2024-05-04T05:30:08","date_gmt":"2024-05-04T09:30:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=27234"},"modified":"2024-05-01T14:03:27","modified_gmt":"2024-05-01T18:03:27","slug":"album-review-the-cyrkle-revival","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2024\/05\/04\/album-review-the-cyrkle-revival\/","title":{"rendered":"Album Review: The Cyrkle \u2013 Revival"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-27235\" src=\"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/cyrkle_revival-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"350\" height=\"350\" srcset=\"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/cyrkle_revival-1.jpg 350w, http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/cyrkle_revival-1-300x300.jpg 300w, http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/cyrkle_revival-1-150x150.jpg 150w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 350px) 100vw, 350px\" \/>Remember the Cyrkle? No? C&#8217;mon; think harder. The mid-60\u2019s group scored a pair of Top 40 successes, first with Paul Simon\u2019s pop confection \u201cRed Rubber Ball\u201d and again with \u201cTurn Down Day.\u201d The Cyrkle then landed the break of a lifetime: an opening spot for The Beatles\u2019 U.S. tour. Unfortunately, that gig wouldn&#8217;t change the band&#8217;s fortunes or long-term prospects\u00a0in a meaningful way; they didn\u2019t trouble the charts again. Though there <em>was<\/em> that soundtrack album for <a href=\"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2018\/04\/17\/album-review-the-cyrkle-the-minx-original-soundtrack\/\">a pornographic film (no, <i>really<\/i>)<\/a>. And that could have been the end of the story; for quite a long time, indeed it was.<\/p>\n<p>But a couple of generations later, original members Don Dannemann and Mike Losekamp teamed up with a Columbus, Ohio comedy-and-oldies cover band called the Gas Pump Jockeys, reviving the Cyrkle name. Coming full circle (groan&#8230;<em>sorry<\/em>), they played gigs and released a live album in 2017. And now in 2024 they have returned with the pointedly-titled <i>Revival<\/i>. Two other members from back-when guest on a couple of songs, and drummer extraordinaire Rick Menck (Velvet Crush, Matthew Sweet) plays on one cut. The songs are a decidedly mixed bag of originals, covers, outside compositions and remakes. Peppy hand claps and twinkly arrangements abound, skirting (and mostly steering clear of) the edges of the rock aesthetic but mainly hewing close to the sugary, lightweight pop that earned the Cyrkle its successes in the \u201860s.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe Visit\u201d and \u201cSinging for Tomorrow\u201d are the highest points, both featuring a chirpy, bubblegum sound and freshly-scrubbed style that recalls the Bob Crewe Generation. The obligatory remakes (\u201cThe 59<sup>th<\/sup> Street Bridge Song\u201d and the Cyrkle\u2019s two biggest hits) aren\u2019t strictly necessary, but they\u2019re well-executed and ultimately do no harm. While this album is something of a curious outlier in the Big Stir stable, it does check the &#8220;pop&#8221; box. No more consequential than the &#8217;60s era configuration of the group, this outing will nonetheless please fans of music that doesn&#8217;t seek to challenge listeners. (And hey, there&#8217;s certainly a place for such music; not everybody wants to rock.) And by that measure, it&#8217;s nice enough.<\/p>\n<p>(By the way, the <a href=\"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2018\/04\/17\/album-review-the-cyrkle-the-minx-original-soundtrack\/\">porn soundtrack is actually better<\/a>.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Remember the Cyrkle? No? C&#8217;mon; think harder. The mid-60\u2019s group scored a pair of Top 40 successes, first with Paul Simon\u2019s pop confection \u201cRed Rubber Ball\u201d and again with \u201cTurn [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":27235,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[49,51,65],"tags":[3398],"class_list":["post-27234","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-new-release","category-pop","category-review","tag-the-cyrkle","cat-49-id","cat-51-id","cat-65-id","has_thumb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27234","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27234"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27234\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27487,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27234\/revisions\/27487"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27235"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27234"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27234"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27234"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}