GOO GOO DOLLS

Seeking inspiration from without as well as within

Past Goo Goo Dolls hits—“Name,” “Slide” and “Let Love In,” to name a few—have been deeply introspective. For the band’s latest album, Something for the Rest of Us, frontman and principal songwriter Johnny Rzeznik wanted to look outside himself. A beautiful ballad, “Notbroken,” paved the way.

“That song was based on conversations I had with a woman whose husband was injured in the Iraq war,” says Rzeznik, taking a break from a video shoot in Los Angeles. “Her husband didn’t want to come home because he felt he would no longer be loved. He had been disabled and she was losing him to his wounds. I wrote the song as a love letter from her to him.”

Several songs on the record address similar themes. Sonically, however, the disc holds firm to the guitar-centric pop rock that has come to be the Dolls’ trademark during their 24 years together. Recording was divided between L.A. and the group’s hometown studio in Buffalo, N.Y. Prior to the sessions, Rzeznik stocked the facility with some of the same gear used on classic albums by the prog-rock band Yes, whose work he’s long admired.

“The sounds on the album were concocted mostly by me and Brad Fernquist, our touring guitarist,” he says. “We went out and got a bunch of vintage amps and a bucket-load of old stomp boxes. We wanted to create unusual sounds by merging those things with modern technology.” Among the album’s other tracks are “Sweetest Lie,” which harks back to the band’s garage-rock days, and the languid ballad “Nightmares and Dreams.”

The album’s sonic density brings to mind Phil Spector’s famous “wall of sound” production style, albeit with guitars at its core. “We recorded a lot of guitars, but each one is doing its own thing,” Rzeznik explains. “We didn’t do a lot of doubling of the guitars. We would get one part and move on to the next, gradually creating a sonic mosaic. The guitars sound like a big wall of sound, but if you listen closely you can hear lots of little things going on.”

Rzeznik isn’t concerned if the new disc doesn’t spawn a flurry of hits in the manner of past Goo Goo Dolls albums. “People tell us if we want to get on radio, we have to compete with people like Lady Gaga,” he says. “I’m like, ‘What are you talking about?’ Things change quickly, especially in the music business. I’m enjoying the time I have now. The rest is out of my hands.”

–Russell Hall

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