Remember The Lightning is a love letter to guitar pop. Its author, S.W. Lauden has been firmly in the grasp of rock and roll since he can remember. Steve’s truly lived a life in rock trenches and lived to tell the tale. He’s not only spent a life writing about rock and roll, he played drums in one time major label darlings, Tsar, as well as in his current band The Brothers Steve. 

Lauden’s writing on music has been a lifelong love affair culminating in several non-fiction books on the subject, and with a series of punk rock detective novels featuring musical PI, Greg Salem. He is even collecting the best writing from his Substack along with several guest contributors for an annual pair of physical books on the subject of guitar pop and its various iterations and purveyors. Volume Three is presently in the works.

During our eclectic and varied chat, we hit upon the idea of cultural inheritance and how we all rebel against it. Steve and I discuss how guitar based rock music has ceased to be the dominant force in music any longer, and why it needed to go back underground to get relevant once again. 

There are forays into the lasting legacy of the Beatles, the waning influence of rock and roll, and the glory of growing up with older brothers who were more like cool uncles. Of course we also tackle the overuse of the term power pop and the nerds that try to neatly define it. 

This is a great chat with a terrific writer who has lived a life deep in the guitar pop salt mines, seen his share of rock history, and a dude who still has much to say about where the artform of guitar pop might be headed, and why it still matters. 

Cheers,

Matty C

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