Song of the Week – Cruel Girl, Red Button

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The Red Button is an LA based power pop duo of Seth Swirsky and Mike Ruekberg. So far, they’ve only released two albums – She’s About to Cross My Mind (2007) and As Far As Yesterday Goes (2011). Even though both have received wide acclaim in power pop circles, you still probably never heard of them.

I know about them because I’m a regular listener to Little Steve’s Underground Garage on SiriusXM. That channel plays a song off the first album called “Cruel Girl” that is today’s SotW.

In 2007, the Underground Garage chose it as one of their weekly “coolest songs in the world.”

“Cruel Girl” has an authentic 60s garage pop sound — retro chiming guitars, harmony vocals and an instantly catchy melody. It could be a missing song from the catalog of The Beatles, Beau Brummels or maybe Badfinger. It’s anyone’s guess. The video for the song captures the era beautifully – all things British, teeming with miniskirts and go-go boots.

According to their official website, Swirsky has been a successful songwriter for other artists (“Instant Pleasure” for Rufus Wainwright, “Love is a Beautiful Thing” for Al Green and the Grammy nominated “Tell it to My Heart” for Taylor Dayne) while Ruekberg composed the soundtrack for the cult classic Dummy.

On a side note, Swirsky is also a baseball fan, writer and memorabilia collector. He owns the infamous ball that slipped through Bill Buckner’s legs and caused almost 20 more years of pain for Red Sox fans (myself included) and the last know bottle of bubbly that the error left unopened that season.

Enjoy… until next week.