Maybe you should Drive

The Barenaked Ladies garnered their highest success in the states with their hit single 'One Week'. This combined with their other major hit, 'If I Had a Million Dollars' misrepresented them to the masses as musical goofballs. Novelty. Yes they have a lot of fun onstage and I applaud their antics. I have an mp3 of them live on stage beginning with a rap about Crocodile Dundee and ends with a twisted version of crocodile rock. However it clouds the fact that they're really talented songwriters. Not just that they can craft a hit single, but full albums of lyrics that are really quite smart.

A little back-story: Gordon was BNL's 1st album, which sold like hotcakes (do people still use this term? What is a hotcake?) In their native Canada and the boys were the equivalent of NKOTB. They would follow up this album with a decidedly more mature sophomore effort, Maybe You Should Drive. The Canucks hated it. Where was the funny? Why are these songs so slow and sad? As with any pop art, once you know the creators behind it, you see the work with new eyes. Ed and Steven, the main songwriters were going through something Joey Ramone might identify with (see post below). Ed's brother was in a motorcycle accident and Steven was battling alcoholism. I assume there was also an effort to be more mature on their follow up album as well. The result is something I recommend to everyone with ears. One of my favs is the last track, 'The Great Provider'. The songs seem hazy and dreamy. Drums are only an accent and the guitar is mostly relegated to harmonics and a few little hammer-ons. It features a BNL trademark of taking a saying and turning it on its ear:

You and I have been through this before
I owe you my whole life, nothing more
I never said that I liked you the most
You're my father; I'm your son, who's the Holy Ghost?
Where does the time go when it's not around here?

My all time favorite instance of this appears on their third album Born on a Pirate Ship in the song 'Stomach vs. Heart'

but tummy just growls
not real words, mostly vowels
and I always forget sometimes Y