CD Review: Goo Goo Dolls "Let Love In"

The three guys in the Goo Goo Dolls formed in the mid 1980s as a little punk band from Buffalo, N.Y., who thought they were the Replacements and originally called themselves the Sex Maggots. They weren’t good enough to live up to either of those names.

Now on their eighth studio album, Let Love In, the Goo Goo Dolls have finally begun to embrace the songs that truly suit it best. Let Love In is the sound of Adult Top 40 Rock turned up to a 11, which isn’t very loud, but it works particularly well.

Collaborating with producer Glen Ballard, famous for his work on Alanis Morrisette’s Jagged Little Pill and infamous for his job on the Dave Matthews Bands' Everyday, spits and shines every song here so much you can’t bare to look at them or risk going blind. But in reality, that’s what the Dolls’ bigger hits have always been about. There’s not a cymbal here that doesn’t crash, there’s not a chord that isn’t plucked, and there’s not a heartstring that isn’t pulled. Even when frontman Johnny Rzeznik is belting out the chorus from the title track, “You're the only one I ever believed in/The answer that could never be found/The moment you decided to let love in ” he doesn’t seem to care the words could have been stolen from a high school diary -- and neither should you.

The highlights are all the ballads, of which there are many. Current single “Stay With You” is a true love anthem, proclaiming “I'll stay with you/The walls will fall before we do” while “Better Days” is a poignant cry for help and a hopeful look ahead for a world mired in the tragedies of Hurricane Katrina and the Iraq War.

“Can’t Let Go” is Rzezniks strongest vocal and also his strongest lyrical outing, the lines “I was your anger/And you were my fear /Now that it's over /Of course it's so clear /But you were no angel /And I was no sin” are delivered without the arena bombast he usually uses, and it all works remarkably well.

That doesn’t mean the Dolls are just candles and Hallmark cards, there’s a fun cover of Supertramp’s “Give A Little Bit” included, although it gets lost among the more serious ballads. Bassist Robby Takac writes and sings two of the songs, “Listen,” and “Strange Love,” which are his strongest to date, but much like the bands previous efforts, they’re veritable throwaways.

Every song on this album is the natural progression from hits like “Name,” “Iris,” and “Here Is Gone,” and we forgive the band much the same way we forgive a band like Bon Jovi -- as long as we can bust out our lighters at the shows, pump our fists to the chorus, and put the songs on our Valentines Day mix-tapes, we’ll always accept a little more Love.

The Verdict: *** 1/2 (out of four)

A slightly altered version of this article was published in the Thursday, April 27, 2006 edition of the Marquette Tribune.