Pointed Sticks were a giddy organ-fueled power pop band with excellent songwriting chops and influences ranging from punk and proto-punk to British invasion, Squeeze, and XTC. The band was formed in early 1978 in Vancouver, Canada. They were the first Canadian band signed to the pioneering UK indie Stiff Records. After several exhilarating singles for the label, the band released their debut album Perfect Youth in 1981 (reissued on Sudden Death in 2005), which was also the year they disbanded. Their long string of singles, along with outtakes and rarities, can be found collected on Waiting For The Real Thing (Sudden Death 2006). Allmusic Guide characterizes their material as "exactly the kind of fresh, spirited pop that modern-day bands like Hot Hot Heat and the Killers never manage to drop the attitude long enough to achieve, and Waiting for the Real Thing is a textbook of how to write should-have-been new wave hits." This is spot on, I think.

I had no idea that Pointed Sticks were touring again or had a MySpace page. I discovered these things only while writing this post. Apparently they played in Vancouver on January 6th, 2007. (Anybody see them?) If this live video of "Out Of Luck" from a gig last year in Tokyo is any indication, Pointed Sticks have a devoted following in Japan.

(YouTube has plenty more videos from the July 30th, 2006 gig in Tokyo and another in Kyoto.)

This is a Filling in the gaps post.