Feel The Goo Once More! Get Those Dolls Lined Up! For GOOd Old Days Are Here Again!

Having recently mentioned the Goos over at Jokonky's (and reupped the fabulous original GOOd Old Days, that you should get if you don't have it yet), I remembered that I had never posted the second volume of my sojourn through the Goo Goo Dolls' discography. Time to rectify that. GOOd Old Days Are Here Again is, in many ways, a real 'Greatest Hits Vol. 2', as record companies would throw it out in the olden days. Since all the real big hits were already on Volume 1, Vol. 2 has deep cuts and minor hits, together with the occasional big hit that was already on the first volume, in a live or demo version. So, you get the same thing here, 

This compilation is also a tale in two parts. The (d)evolution of the Goos is clearly on display here. From their grunting punk rock beginnings towards the corporate-disguised-as-alternative rock of the mid- and late-90s to the increasingly AOR/adult contemporary music of the 2000s all the way to now. So, if you prefer the Goos as a kick-ass rock band, you can probably cut off this comp after the first twelve songs or so, if your aversion to, uh, slighly gooey adult contemporary ballads is high, you can probably listen all the way through and find the occasional highlight in the back half of the comp. 

What you will get here, though, with the big hits out of the way which were pretty much all Johnny Rzeznick's, is a bit more of Robbie Takaj. As the original lead vocalist for the first two albums, Takaj was always the lovable caveman sidekick to pretty boy Johnny, with an appropriately grunting and primitive take on things. Where Rzeznick's songs would become slicker and hookier and tailored to mainstream radio, Takaj pretty much stuck with a simple 'pedal to the medal' approach to rock, which nicely contrasted with Rzeznick's style on the two or three numbers he would get on each album. Since the, uh, songwriting of their self-titled debut is, uh, rather undistinguished - to go with the muffled, rudimentary sound of this $750 production - I decided to include their cover of Blue Öyster Cult's "Don't Fear The Reaper"; "James Dean" from follow-up Jed is Rzeznick's first lead vocal and the first acoustic song the Goos ever did - the road to stardom starts here, even if the song itself isn't a precursor, but rather a prolonged set up for a so-so joke. 

And from 1990's Hold Me Up on, it was essentially Rzeznick's show, with "Just The Way You Are" announcing the more professional and slicker sound that would carry the band through the 90s and to millions of record sales. Lots of crunchy guitars and nice hooks here. The 'sneak in some hits' tactic yields acoustic versions of breakthrough hit "Name" and "Slide". There are also some genuine hits I didn't include on GOOd Old Days: "Broadway" (in a live version I prefer to the studio cut) and "Black Balloon", Takaj checks back in with "Amigone" from Dizzy Up The Girl, showing how much slicker even his songs were, and from then, well, we enter the AOR portion of the Goos. 2010's "The Sweetest Lie" brings up some crunchy guitars for a last time, while 2019's "Miracle Pill" from the same album is pure pop, but it's really well-made pop. 

So, ready for round two with the Goos for a kick-ass start in your weekend? Goo for it...

Let's remember the GOOd Old Days of Johnny & the boys

Johnny Rzeznik was probably too cute to not become a sex symbol at some point (though plastic surgery has done quite a number on ol' Johnny, he looks like an aging drag queen now. What the fuck, dude?), and he was definitely writing songs that were way too catchy to not become hits and make the Goo Goo Dolls one of the biggest alternative rock bands of the mid- to late 90s. Sure, there is another reality where Johnny never really composes much, leaves the lead vocals to Robbie Takac and the Goo Goo Dolls continue bringing out thrashing, primitive punk rock to the few initiated before quietly breaking up. Instead, Rzeznik - even before making them a hit machine churning out power ballads - brought a dynamism and mainstream-friendy appeal to his compositions that saw the Dolls go from their sloppy, not very impressive punk rock of their first two albums to alternative rock superstars, then adult contemporary mainstays. But to remember how good the Goos could be, let's go back and look at the good old days on GOOd Old Days. 

Opener "There You Are" shows how much more dynamic and more widescreen, for lack of a better word, the Rzeznik-led Dolls are. By 1994, Rzeznik was the undisputed lead singer and main songwriter of the band. The band had at that time put all their effort into Superstar Car Wash, an album and its singles that the band and its label thought was going to break them through to the mainstream. And it does have a number of good tracks, notably "We Are The Normal", Rzeznik's collaboration with his idol, The Mats' Paul Westerberg. It was a long-distance thing, both sending tapes, but still, a thing of the bucket list for Rzeznik. But the album didn't do as well as everyone hoped and by the time of recording its follow-up, Rzeznik was seriously thinking off hanging it up, as far as a full-time rock'n'roll career was concerned. Then, he came in with the demo for the traditional acoustic track. That track was "Name" and became the band's first top ten hit, and from there they were unstoppable for a couple of years. 

It's rare for a band that their commercial and artistic peak overlap. Often, bands get their breakthrough when their musical direction is just starting to go in the wrong direction, or they have their best work right after the mainstream audience zones out. But in the case of the Goo Goo Dolls, their commercial breakthrough A Boy Named Goo and follow-up blockbuster Dizzy Up The Girl with mega hit "Iris" were the best work of the album. Rzeznik tossed off songs that were catchy, commercial and also good. A full ten tracks, or half of the compilation put together by yours truly, come from this time period. By the time they released Gutterflower in 2002 Rzeznik's big power ballads started to come off a bit pandering, and while the band still managed a bunch of chart hits until 2007, the music started to become more formulaic. Incidentally, Gutterflower is also the last album that has a harder edge throughout, as from follow-up Let Love In they really started to drift into the realm of adult contemporay and their early punk days were a distant memory. The last fifteen years or so have largely been mid tempo ballad goo to swim through to find the occasional good song. 

Slightly belying its title, GOOd Old Days tries to turn up some good stuff from the late period towards the end of the comp, including the sprightly "Rebel Beat". The compilation ends with an acoustic version of "Boxes", a wistful tune of a middle-aged man looking back at his life and thanking his life-partner and then a cover of Tom Petty's "I Won't Back Down", firmly showing that the Goos have arrived in the realm of dad rock. The Goo Goo Dolls grew into middle age along with us, and they did it without embarassing themselves. But they were better in the good old days, and GOOd Old Days will hopefully make you remember that...