Bellybutton by Jellyfish

Bellybutton, the 1990 debut from San Francisco's Jellyfish, arrived while rock was busy teasing its hair or turning up the fuzz, and it didn't care one bit. Andy Sturmer, who drummed and sang, and Roger Manning, on keyboards and vocals, had been friends since high school; they quit Beatnik Beatch to write together, pulled in Jason Falkner, fresh out of the Three O'Clock, on guitar and Roger's brother Chris on bass, and cut the album at Schnee Studios in North Hollywood with Albhy Galuten and Jack Joseph Puig producing.

The sound is candy-colored power pop with a 1960s classic-rock heart and a clear taste for XTC: stacked harmonies, bouncing keyboards, hooks folded inside hooks. Critics adored it, even though it stalled at No. 124 on the US chart, and "The King Is Half-Undressed" and "That Is Why" both became Modern Rock Tracks hits. In 2007 McFly took their cover of "Baby's Coming Back" to No. 1 in Britain.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.