I've been a fan of late 60s / early 70s bubblegum pop since I was in high school, but I've been getting back into it recently (I suppose inspired by Lou Christie's passing) and listening to a boatload of bubblegum singles. It's been a lot of fun to hear more singles from familiar groups and discover some new artists.
I can't stop playing this new discovery in particular:
Not only is bubblegum a great genre in itself, but it was so influential on the development of glam rock, punk rock, and twee pop. What are your favorite bubblegum pop songs? And while the genre is not known for its albums, do you have any favorite albums or compilations?
This was the comp that got me into bubblegum in the first place:
(More so bubblegum dance technically, which is another interesting genre, but it has plenty of sonic roots in bubblegum itself, largely laundered through punk) _________________ Join us in the canon game / Add me on RYM
Not only is bubblegum a great genre in itself, but it was so influential on the development of glam rock, punk rock, and twee pop. What are your favorite bubblegum pop songs? And while the genre is not known for its albums, do you have any favorite albums or compilations?
That's a bit of a problem here, actually — if you look at the self-titled album by The Ohio Express, arguably the quintessential bubblegum album that nearly defined the whole subgenre (at least in the USA) along with "Simon Says" by the 1910 Fruitgum Co., these albums are hardly ranked on BEA at all. The former doesn't appear in a single chart here, and the latter has a Rank Score of 3.
So yeah, not much love from the folks here, and I'm just as bad as everyone else when it comes to putting these albums into score-generating charts.
If I get a chance soon-ish (and assuming someone else doesn't get to it first), this comp from last year might be a good add for the BEA database — three CDs worth of classic bubblegum singles in one chewy box.
Bubblegum wasn't a genre I was very familiar with, but just been checking out some of the compilation albums in the original thread post. Heard lots of these songs before, but never realised they were bubblegum (also hadn't realised Tiffany's '80s hit was a cover of a Ritchie Cordell track on one of those albums). I'll definitely be checking some more of these out. Good to give visibility to some of these genres and in agreement that BEA is thin around the edges in certain places.
Last edited by albummaster on 07/10/2025 08:18; edited 1 time in total
[quote="baystateoftheart"]I've been a fan of late 60s / early 70s bubblegum pop since I was in high school, but I've been getting back into it recently (I suppose inspired by Lou Christie's passing) and listening to a boatload of bubblegum singles. It's been a lot of fun to hear more singles from familiar groups and discover some new artists.
I can't stop playing this new discovery in particular:
This was one that had been buried in the far flung reaches of my brain. Having just listened to it it does bring back memories of my sister playing all of this stuff over and over again. She was a huge fan of bubblegum. Going to have to tap into her memories and share a few
That's a bit of a problem here, actually — if you look at the self-titled album by The Ohio Express, arguably the quintessential bubblegum album that nearly defined the whole subgenre (at least in the USA) along with "Simon Says" by the 1910 Fruitgum Co., these albums are hardly ranked on BEA at all. The former doesn't appear in a single chart here, and the latter has a Rank Score of 3.
So yeah, not much love from the folks here, and I'm just as bad as everyone else when it comes to putting these albums into score-generating charts.
If I get a chance soon-ish (and assuming someone else doesn't get to it first), this comp from last year might be a good add for the BEA database — three CDs worth of classic bubblegum singles in one chewy box.
Maybe I'm part of the problem, because I haven't listened to either of those albums...
I do have the below compilation though, which I added to BEA, and it's on my to-do list to listen to more by Ohio Express. I was going to go for a greatest hits, but would you recommend that LP instead?
Bubblegum wasn't a genre I was very familiar with, but just been checking out some of the compilation albums in the original thread. Heard lots of these songs before, but never realised they were bubblegum (also hadn't realised Tiffany's '80s hit was a cover of a Ritchie Cordell track on one of those albums). I'll definitely be checking some more of these out. Good to give visibility to some of these genres and in agreement that BEA is thin around the edges in certain places.
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