Jellyfish stack hook on hook on the power-pop feast “The King Is Half-Undressed”

Most power-pop is a hunt for the one perfect hook. Jellyfish wanted all of them at once. “The King Is Half-Undressed,” the centrepiece of 1990’s Bellybutton, is a parade of melodic ideas, key changes and stacked harmonies that by rights should buckle under its own ambition — and instead it struts. This is a band flexing its musicianship and daring you to keep up.

The lineage is worn proudly: Beatles harmonies, Queen drama, Beach Boys sunshine, all folded into a baroque-pop arrangement that layers voice on voice until the thing practically gleams. Andy Sturmer and Roger Manning never met a melodic idea they wanted to save for the next song, and the sheer surplus of hooks is the band’s signature.

What keeps it from being mere showing-off is how well it’s played and sung. Sturmer drums and sings lead at the same time, the harmonies are immaculate, and the writing partnership’s overflowing ideas are corralled into something that — against the odds — actually coheres. It’s a craftsman’s record, the kind musicians press on one another.

That’s exactly why it endured. “The King Is Half-Undressed” became a quiet touchstone for every power-pop revivalist who came after, a reference point for how much joy and detail you can pack into three-and-a-half minutes without the wheels coming off. Its reputation has only grown.

The maximalism is also the catch. The song is so densely packed that it never quite breathes, and all that cleverness can hold an actual emotion at arm’s length — it dazzles more than it moves you. If you want a power-pop song that breaks your heart, this isn’t it; if you want one that makes your jaw drop at the craft, it absolutely is.

Final take: “The King Is Half-Undressed” is a dazzling, gloriously overstuffed power-pop showcase that prizes harmony and craft above all — Jellyfish announcing a band with more good ideas than it knew what to do with. Thirty-odd years on, it’s still more than most bands manage in a career.