What do you do when you’ve lost half the duo that was the heart and soul of your band? Let the whole band be your heart & soul. Sure, you can still have your leader, but he was so good, you have to replace him with the rest of the band. Thus is the approach Barenaked Ladies have taken with the creation of this new album & the departure of Steven Page. Think about it, every major hit BNL has had has involved Page. The result is a more complete, but also more mature & slightly less interesting & original BNL.
Highlights Include:
Summertime
Four Seconds
On the Lookout
How Long
Original co-founder with Page, Ed Robertson is still the most seasoned & has the most consistently good songs in the band, but it is nice to actually hear the other members, all of which make a vocal appearance, if not songwriting appearance at some point in the album. Kevin Hearn takes the softer more folk approach to his songs (something you’d never have heard on a BNL album before, probably for good reason), and Jim Creeggan takes a more adult contemporary approach, in the vain of a Rob Thomas. But even with the new changes, something is still very noticeably off. Take for example lyrics like this:
“Even a busted watch is right twice a day”
Now, I may just be forgetting and the band may have had poorly written and lazy lyrics like this in the Page days, but it becomes all the more noticeable now. Something is off, and the band just isn’t the same anymore. What’s worse is that they’ve gone forcibly headlong mostly in the the lite hits/adult contemporary genre. If you’re a fan of that genre, which the band had always hung around, you’ll be very pleased with this album. But there simply isn’t any chances taken apart from letting the rest of the band share the workload left by Page.
Overall, while it is far from being bad, and it’s a pleasant listen, the Barenaked Ladies have put some clothes on to expose the member they’ve lost, and it shows. A more casual fan might not notice, some hardcore fans may not care, but for those of us that knew that part of the soul of the band was in Page, and thusly admired his work, the band simply isn’t the same, but still do a great chorus. Take it or leave it at that.
