AMNESTY 2011: Fountains of Wayne – Someone’s Gonna Break Your Heart
Yeah, it’s still 1999 in someone’s heart.

[Video][Website]
[6.29]
Jonathan Bogart: I’m a heartless monster, I know, but power pop after about 1995 is about as likely to thrill me or show me something new as ragtime after 1922.
[5]
Edward Okulicz: Fountains of Wayne are such effective craftsmen that even a hook like this song’s, a “whoa-oh-oh” repeating seemingly endlessly, doesn’t grate because it’s more AM-radio background noise than attention-grabbing throb. The lyrics are a muddle of nothing, which doesn’t matter because as thet titular line is clear, again, like that radio hit of yore whose chorus lyrics you know but the verses are new to you each time. There’s some kind of alchemy in how a standard-issue guitar chug sounds so colorful and alive when you bash a piano key on top of it. And Chris Collingwood’s lightly grating tones have sat uneasily on top of post-grunge, country pastiches, twinkly waltzes, so that he sounds gruffly hopeless over a polite bluster of resigned guitars is no surprise and of no consequence. Only sick, sick people still care about this in 2011. I believe there is a special circle of Hell reserved for people who go on and on about “perfect pop” and I’m bound for it.
[10]
Katherine St Asaph: If you must plan on breaking my heart, it’s not enough to have a guitar and make it sound like wringing loose sighs. You should also at least try to sing.
[6]
Anthony Easton: It does what Fountains of Wayne does well — the perfectly crafted horribly sad pop song in happy pop song drag. I wish what that I could tell what was a successful attempt at this and an unsuccessful attempt at this more than just by gut. This is not nearly as good as “Mexican Wine” or “Hey Julie” or “Bright Future in Sales”; but I cannot honestly distinguish why those songs are better than this one. Extra point for the woo-oo chorus.
[6]
Brad Shoup: Though its artists pay reflexive tribute to the Fab Four, power pop has always been haunted by the specter of the Kinks and Big Star: the perceived intelligence of their lyrics has wrought wending, wordy texts studded with detail and a fidelity to a sacred book of chord changes. Spend too much time on these elements, and you lose the power portion, to say nothing of the pop. “Someone’s Gonna Break Your Heart” spends quite a bit of time ragging on stale music (suits singing, “radio crime”, awful campfire singalongs) to the point where I have to conclude the refrain’s flat “oh whoa oh” has to be some sort of meta joke. Those high-key piano pings, always a shortcut to excitement, are abandoned quickly, leaving a well-constructed song that limns disappointment but leaves little but great imagery. Like the Shins, this relies on our sympathies for bygone guitar architecture, but Fountains of Wayne have the smarts to present all the elements clearly.
[6]
Jer Fairall: A chiming, heartfelt slice of mid-tempo pop professionalism, but if I wanna listen to any 2011 music from a true power pop songwriting craftsman, I still have Tommy Keene’s Behind The Parade sitting right here on my desk.
[6]
Alfred Soto: A tug on guitar and heart strings, wo-wo-wo’s, and lyrics whose lyrics can’t hide redundant this sort of thing is.
[5]
Hail Okulicz; this tugged open a modern power-pop itch.
I feel like the chorus of 5s and 6s makes me seem even more demented than if it had mostly got 0s and 1s other than my 10.
The Shins! I was wondering which prog band the prechorus reminded me of, and it turns out to have been… the Shins.
I was cheering so hard for this song on this website. Fountains of Wayne are the best.
As long as one pretends that horrible fourth album never happened! I guess I love the fact that _one_ band that I was into in high school is still putting out good records.