The Guess Who, despite their good intentions, have never seemed like natural candidates for superstardom. With a collective personality that could be described as lumpy at best, dressed neatly in a set of duds at least two years out of time, and possessing few of those flashy stories that are so desperately needed to flesh out the bottom of the myth, they might have been put aside as yet another example of a Canadian music scene still in the process of searching for the roots of its home-grown musical identity.

But there ain't nothin' like a hit single to change a group's fate, and to their credit the Guess Who have had a slew of them. So many, in fact, that this is the first recent such album I've heard which manages to stand up strong, with a minimum of dead moments and a lot of good times.

"Laughing," "No Sugar Tonight" and "Share The Land" all contain the one thing that any hit single needs to make it a hit single once you've heard it, you never stop hearing it. Play it a few times, take it off, walk outside the house, and it's still there with you, buzzing just inside the lower medula, a little soundtrack that sets itself to everything and anything. Instant nostalgia, if you will, since about the only way one can cope with the constant hunger to experience the song is to go home and run it again. Hooked, yes indeed, and that's all there is to it.

I've picked "Laughing," "No Sugar Tonight" and "Share The Land" as the best tracks here, simply because they seem to me to represent the very essence of what the Guess Who are, where all the influences have been nicely digested and they're simply doin' what comes naturally. As they get farther from this, which comes to mean when they're simply trying on styles, things tend to get a little shallow. "These Eyes" is pretty, but Randy Bachman isn't Dennis Yost and the Classic IV, and so what would be kind of ghostly in the latter's hands is merely sentimental blah with Bachman. Similarly, "Undun" is the kind of thing that happens when groups decide that they simply have to inject a little jazz into their muzak, and since the Guess Who obviously don't listen much to Pharoah Sanders, we're presented with the kind of neutral MOR bossa-nova that forced up progressive (remember that?) rock in the first place.

"American Woman" almost works (in fact, the production usually manages to pull it over the top eight out of ten times), except that it eventually comes off as just a shade too jive and unbelievable. The Guess Who, even if their lead vocalist does deliver a series of grunts worthy of the milder side of Screamin' Jay, just were never that mean and nasty. "No Time" is much better: a guitar move from Spirit to lead it off, a bit of semi-chorus to attract your interest, and then that double-dealing powerhouse of material over arrangement over guitar licks and voices and refrains. Just wunnerful. "Hang On To Your Life" is also quite a number, with the most tasteful use of a tape-loop echo chamber in the longest of whiles, and, uh, yes, one of those choruses again. And then there's "Hand Me Down World," with this great chorus, and "Bus Rider," which don't do too badly with its chorus either, and "Do You Miss Me Darling" (wait'll you hear the chorus), and even "New Mother Nature" (with a great chorus).

Further reading on Super Seventies RockSite!: Album Review: Road Food Album Review: Flavours Single Review: "American Woman" Guess Who Lyrics Guess Who Videos Burton Cummings Mugshots

So a good band and a Best album. Can you beat it? Available at your local neighborhood supermarket or department store; cheap at twice the price.

- Lenny Kaye, Rolling Stone, 6-24-71.

Bonus Reviews!

The best cuts from one of the top Canadian groups known in America have been bottled and branded in this LP for the Guess Who. Included here are songs such as "These Eyes," "Undun," "American Woman," "Share The Land" and "Hang On To Your Life," all performed in the typical Guess Who fashion. This LP will be a must for their fans and Top 40 listeners across the country.

- Billboard, 1971.

A fine single-disc collection of the band's greatest hits, it's perfect for listeners who don't want to invest in the double-disc Track Record Collection. * * * *

- The All-Music Guide to Rock, 1995.

The Best of the Guess Who is a compact collection of some of the best AM radio rock hits of all time. * * * * *

- William Hanson, Musichound Rock: The Essential Album Guide, 1996.

 Reader's Comments

Chuck Sparks (Jan. 2024)

I picked up the American Woman cd to revisit it and was surprised that neither of the band's 1970 albums made the classic 500 or the reader's favorites. Although I haven't listened to the original album in probably fifty years, I have listened to their best of many times. The problem with the "best of" albums is it gives very little context. Their last album with Bachman was the first one of the seventies and was everywhere. It sounded great to my eleven year old ears. And now it sounds dated in a good way, like history, or social studies. Still like the "hits" but it's always fun to remember what the cool older kids were blasting out of their windows while we were shooting hoops.

superseventies (Moderator) (Jan. 2024)

We do have Road Food from '74 with the great "Clap For The Wolfman" and lesser hit "Star Baby" in the Classic 500, and Flavours from the following year in the Readers Favorites.

This Best of The Guess Who album became somewhat obsolete when the more comprehensive 2-disc Track Record Collection came out in 1988. Even if I only care to listen to 4 songs ("Guns Guns Guns," "Glamour Boy," "Dancin' Fool" and "When the Band Was Singing Shakin' All Over") on the second CD.

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