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Dawes’ ‘Good Luck With Whatever’ Is Another Lucky Strike for One of Rock’s Best Bands

On Dawes’ terrific seventh album, Taylor Goldsmith gently wrestles with post-marital maturity and rock’s Peter Pan spirit, in recordings that veer back toward the band’s live spark.  Taylor Goldsmith, frontman of the band gives you several occasions to consider his physical or psychological age in ‘Good Luck With Whatever’.

He comes close to outright claiming he’s having a hard time growing up in the record’s bookending tracks. “Still Feel Like a Kid,” the raucous opener, finds Goldsmith crowing that he still “go[es] three times round revolving doors,” even while facing marriage, potential parenthood and Nasdaq investments. (The album was recorded far enough back that the reference to impending dadhood was presumably a projection, well prior to the singer and wife Mandy Moore announcing their pending parenthood)

The punchline, inevitably, is that everyone in his business has embraced stunted development. He comes back to that theme with a flash of wariness on the closing track, “Me Especially,” in which he sings, “Why am I the youngest guy my age? / Why am I still reading the same page? / I know it’s hard for everyone, but me especially.