September 18, 2010

If what some of the rest of us want from the Goo Goo Dolls is a return to the trio's harder-rocking, pre-"Name" roots, then the Goos have tossed us a bone. The group's first new album in four years, "Something for the Rest of Us," hardly re-creates the world of "Jed" or "Superstar Car Wash." But the set has a fullness and energy—not to mention an arsenal of layered guitars—that give it the kind of muscle we haven't heard from the band in quite some time. The song "Sweetest Lie" starts things off with hand claps and a galloping gait, while "One Night," "Still Your Song" and the Robby Takac-sung pair of "Now I Hear" and "Say You're Free" mix propulsion with polished pop craft. Even John Rzeznik's more melodic moments follow suit, displaying both emotional and musical heft on ambient fare like "As I Am" and dynamic ebb and flows like "Nothing Is Real" and "Notbroken." Rzeznik is still grappling with relationship tumult throughout these 12 songs. But it's with a more outward-looking perspective that invests listeners in his quest for the answer to the question, "Can we make it through the darkness?"—Gary Graff

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