After a string of low-fi pop singles last summer, indie-rock teen prodigy Bethany Cosentino — cat lover, foodie, Breeders fan — decided on a simple recipe for her debut LP with partner Bobb Bruno: Beatles-ish drums, Ramones-ish guitars, Phil Spector-ish vocals. The result: reverb-frosted tunes full of girl-group tunefulness and Nineties alt-rock snarl. It's catchy and pleasure-packed, even if the smartass, lovelorn lyrics never get much deeper than "Want to kill you but then I'd miss you." Modern but classic, it's a summer play-on-repeat record that even your grandma might dig.

“Everyday People”

"Everyday People" managed to trailblaze in two different ways -- it was one of the first pop hits to deal with the subject of racial harmony, and it utilized Larry Graham's "slap" technique on the bass guitar, which would soon be copied by countless other bassists. Graham once said about his pulsating style, "I'd never done that before … that's where the freedom of creativity came in for the band, that we'd be allowed to do that." In 1978, the song's line "Different strokes for different folks" would be borrowed for the title of the hit television show Diff'rent Strokes.