Lemonheads and Psychedelic Furs at Grand Central Miami October 28

Even though the high point of both the Lemonheads’ and the Psychedelic Furs’ careers is a song from a movie, these bands are as decade-defining as the films that their hits soundtracked. The Lemonheads’ cover of “Mrs. Robinson” was invented to coincide with the early-’90s VHS release of the ’60s classic The Graduate. Six years earlier, the Psychedelic Furs’ “Pretty in Pink” was the inspiration for John Hughes’s oft-imitated 1986 film of the same name. In the ’90s, Evan Dando and the Lemonheads were the poppy alternative to grunge, making no effort to obscure either their melodies or their good looks. And in the previous decade, the Furs’ synth-pop rock was the template for all latter-day New Wave musical clichés: big choruses, deadpan vocals, and keyboards that sound like flutes. So to the uninitiated, these two bands may be nothing more than a pair of retro one-hit wonders. But to those who do know, the Lemonheads and the Psychedelic Furs simply aimed for — and slightly missed the mark on — pop superstardom.