Iconic band celebrates 25 years together

The Goo Goo Dolls rocked the 80’s, 90’s and now the new millennium with a wide variety of songs that have subtly changed over the years. The band, which first started up in 1986, has sold over 9 million albums over the past 25 years they have been playing together. Lead singer/guitarist, John Rzeznik and singer/bass guitarist, Robby Takac, formed the band and still have retained a name in the music industry, with only adding one new drummer, Mike Malinin during the course of their career.

Their current tour has been going on since April of 2010, but the band has been enjoying every minute of it, according to Takac.  Michelle Branch and Parachute have been their opening acts for the past six weeks and everything seems to be going great, except for the hot weather they have been enduring across the country. This summer, the Goo Goo Dolls started to change up the tour and play some older songs that some of their loyal fans greatly appreciated.  Along with tunes from the 90’s, the band has also been playing some new songs that haven’t been released yet.

Takac and the rest of the band take touring and their fans seriously and would never want to disappoint a crowd. “We are firing out all cylinders most nights,” Takac said.  However, when it comes to the band having fun on and off their tour bus, they don’t have very much down time.  “We are so busy, but we try to stay healthy and exercise,” Takac said. Besides finding time to have fun, the band has had struggles facing the new age of technology and how it has changed over the years.  If they are working on anything, it’s getting their music out and being on top of the quick pace that new-media is now facing.

“It’s about being out there now, it’s about getting stuff out quick,” Takac said. “Information moves quickly these days and so I think we are just going to keep recording along the way, keep doing shows along the way…we got to do a little bit of muse chasing now.” What has sparked an interest in the band has been the explosion that Facebook has caused on the World Wide Web. Now that YouTube is an easy way to listen to old or new music, records are not selling as much and bands such as the Goo Goo Dolls, are slipping in sales.

Takac, along with the rest of the band, has truly appreciated everything that technology and social media has brought to the table. “I think the web itself helps us,” Takac said.  “I can reach 1 million and a half people on Facebook right now, people who care about what the Goo Goo Dolls do. That’s crazy. You never could have done that before, never.” Facebook has played a huge role in developing their career even further and making sure that the Goo Goo Dolls are still well known and appreciated. 

Due to their extremely wide fan base, they have changed the music over the years to adapt to the decades at hand.  However, according to the band, they are still the same artists and believe in the same things. “I think we’re 20-year-old kids who like punk/rock music, you know, and we’ve managed to stay together through growing up into adults who listen to different kinds of music,” says Takac.  “Though that kind of developed the sound that we build off of, so I think as we grow up our music grows up.” According to Takac, the audience has grown into a “bizarre” group of people.  They have ranged from an older audience with their kids by their side, to a new generation of listeners that are just starting to appreciate the music for the first time.  Although this may not be what the band is used to, the “bizarre” group is a good thing for them, and they still appreciate every fan they get. 

The band sees their ability to draw from so many different age groups as a factor in what makes them extremely unique in today’s music industry. The big bomb that has landed their career recently has been the release of their new single, “All That You Are.”  Not only has it been getting a positive reaction from fans across the spectrum, but it’s also in the new movie, Transformers: Dark of the Moon. Takac has found that having their songs played in movies has helped to boost their career in the past. “It’s great to be involved in something this enormous and has that big of a machine behind it, meaning the Transformers movie,” Takac said.  “Especially when you are just headed out on a tour, and we have had success with movies in the past.  For us, movies have been a great catalyst for us to be out there and making things happen.”