Pop aficionados often feel the need to be apologetic. Few would would openly admit to preferring those early bouncy Beatles singles to the Fab Four's more musically adventurous output of later years, or to having danced around the living room to "La Vida Loca." Even the shiny surfaces of Cornelius are subject to rigorous deconstruction on the pages of music magazines. Something so perfect, so subtle -- they reason -- must somehow transcend the realm of mere pop.
To assuage the guilty pleasure that pop music holds for the true music connoisseur, the suffix of avant, or avant garde, is often appended to the pop label as if something that is quirky or weird could somehow warrant one's attention more than something that is only pop.
The trio Slapp Happy, as the fliers for their upcoming Japanese tour attest, have been saddled with the avant-garde label since their first recording back in 1972.