First up is "The Bus Driver Blues". Telling the tale of a stressed out and ego-tripping bus driver, the song is a Canadian classic. Extremely witty and biting, it really shows Goddo's flair for all things sardonic. I love Greg Godovitz's bass sound, very rubbery and Beatles-esque. "Drive Me Crazy" is like an insane version of Bad Company, a rolling blues-rocker about sex, but driven by a wacky drum beat, slightly off-kilter. A quirky song, not bad. "Let That Lizard Loose" is one of the band's most famous songs. Showing the growing influence of punk music, the song is based around three simple guitar power chords, very basic, yet highly catchy. The solos are quite weak musically speaking, but this is fun music and should not be taken too seriously, after all the song is a fun ode to the male appendage, Goddo bridged the gap between punk and hard-rock, straddling the line between each genre.
"I'm Losing You" is the most pop-like song on the album. It starts very slow with gentle acoustics, before crashing into a very heavy transition, before returning to a washy chorus. Very Beatles-like, I like the ambitious nature of the song. However, the drumming is very distracting. Very out of sync with the guitars, I can't seem to find the musical "anchor" of the song, the timing is very off. Knowing Goddo, this could have been on purpose, but distracting nonetheless. Also, the song is over seven-minutes long, and really starts to grind the nerves, given the repetitive structure and odd beat. Skip this one. "Let It Slide" kicks up the energy level. Very punk, it's loud, snotty, and crunchy. However, the song is basically a pop song at heart. The song reminds me of Cheap Trick, with the pop-punk-Beatles, think "Hello There" by said band, and you have a starting point. Good song. "Twelve Days" is a retro rocker (at that point). Harkening to the early days of Chuck Berry, it's a blues-rocker with some odd and complicated progressive(for Goddo anyways) chord changes. Godovitz's voice sounds awful, but I feel that the producer was going for a somewhat lo-fidelity approach. "Who-like" guitar strums add bombast, but fail to save the song. I just can't really get past the terrible production on this song, it's far too loud and everything sounds distorted and nasty. Not a bad song, but sounds terrible.
"Under My Hat" is mellow and jazzy. Electric piano dominates the song. A nice change from the very brash songs on Side 2, Godovitz shows that he is actually has a very nice pop-music voice, something that the band would increasingly explore on later albums. Guitar solos are a little too busy for my taste, but a great song, with especially excellent bass work by Godovitz. Last up is my favorite Goddo song, "Hard Years" is punk-metal perfection. A swaggering riff is on fire, the song is like a powder keg exploding in your face. Slightly sloppy in terms of playing, I actual like the fact that bass and guitar are slightly out of sync with each other. An absolute classic, listen to it now.
"Goddo" is a very good album. It and the band have gone largely unrecognized outside Canada, shamefully so. This is by far their best album in my opinion, despite some very sloppy playing and questionable production.
Rating-7.5/10
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