The Good Things

Some bands aspire to become a successful touring act. Others spend their lives dreaming about scoring a record deal. Then there’s Detroit’s The Good Things, who pretty much have their minds set on being bigger than the Beatles within the next six months.
“Not so much bigger than the Beatles,” interjects singer/drummer John Morales, “just bigger than Jesus.”
“I mean, it’s going to take a few more months …” singer/guitarist Ryan Cox adds sensibly.
Fortunately for us all, The Good Things are really, really good at deadpanning. But while the thrilling threesome won’t be beating the Fab Four in a popularity contest any time soon, The Good Things really do have a good thing going on. Two parts Beatles, one part White Stripes and a pinch of indie-rock quirk a la The Zutons – that’s the recipe the power-trio delivers, both on its debut EP, Side 1, and in its bombastic live set, which has been freaking people out from the Midwest to the Atlantic for the past six months.
“‘What the fuck are you doing here?’” Morales blurts. “That’s pretty much been the reaction, because we’ve only been playing out for six months, so most of our gigs are pretty small. But we come off as pretty polished and experienced, even though we’ve only been playing for a short amount of time, so people are pretty impressed and wondering why we’re not doing larger gigs.”
“A lot of people will see us and expect that it’s some kind of freak accident that we’re in a bar like that,” Cox says. I’ll back him up on that, since that’s precisely what I was thinking when I saw the three cram themselves onto a stage the size of a couch at the last Dewey Beach Conference and proceed to rock the sandles off the unsuspecting crowd.
The Good Things are rounded out by bassist Steven Decker, aka Steven Christopher, aka “The Sauce,” a nickname he was given by default since he couldn’t decide on a stage name. (“He’s indecisive and slightly metrosexual,” Cox says matter-of-factly.) The band got its start last December, when Morales moved back from the West Coast to find Cox macking on his sister. The two hit if off and started writing songs together, eventually landing on the sound that would define The Good Things – a garage-y, Technicolor power-pop riot that smacks you between the eyes like a Styrofoam sledgehammer.
Since the White Stripes had already cornered the market on guitar-and-drum rock duos from Detroit, Cox and Morales immediately started auditioning bassists. Nothing worked out, but then they bumped into The Sauce at a party in March, and The Good Things were born. By May, the band was on the road playing an endless stream of shows just about everywhere but Detroit.
“We knew what we wanted to do,” Morales explains. “We want to establish ourselves in the general Midwest area. We don’t want to just stay in Detroit. To really get anyone’s attention on a more national scale, you have to have a larger region. We can’t just have people in Detroit say we’re great and then go to California and expect people to like us.”
The Good Things’ pristine live set and utterly accessible sound – as Cox points out, “Hey – everybody likes the Beatles!” – have created a murmur in the music community. The band hopes to upgrade the murmur to an official din with the release of Side 2 in March. But regardless of whether the second EP elicits Beatle-dom or boredom, you can bet that The Good Things will still be on the road, doing that thing they do.
“The idea is, just so long as we can do this for a living and pay all of our bills with this, that’s pretty much what we’re looking for,” Morales says.
“As long as people want us,” Cox chimes in, “we’ll come to them and we’ll keep bringing out new music for ’em.” - Fly Magazine (Harrisburg, PA) - December 2007

For a little while, after the success of the White Stripes and Von Bondies, it seemed like Detroit would be the next fertile ground discovered, the next source for bankable rock-n-roll talent. This was a big to-do about nothing, even if Seymour Stein was seen around town in a shirt as pink as salmon.

A few years removed from the hype, it’s a good thing there are bands like the Good Things around to wave high the flag of Detroit rock pride. Their stamp on the formula reads “Does. Not. Give. A. Fuck.�, and on their debut EP, hints of fellow D-town heroes like the Go, the High Strung, the Sights, and yes, ol’ Jacky boy himself (check out the Stripes-esque high-pitched howls on “Cinnamon�) can be found. But, there’s progression here, with some serious Beatles/Kinks love by way of slacker-informed indie rock. The riff in “Wasting Time� merges the Fab Four’s “Everybody’s Got Something to Hide Except for Me and My Monkey� with the Lilys’ “Paz en el Hogar� perfectly, and the acoustic flourishes on opener “You’ve Got me High� and closer “Strung Out� are pure Ray Davies perfection, filtered slightly through Stephen Malkmus’ looking glass. It’s the kind of stuff that wouldn’t be out of place on the Rainbow Quartz roster or in Little Stevens Underground Garage, but the Good Things are just too cool to care. – Ryan Allen - Detour (Detroit, MI)

The Good Things
Side 1
Self-released

In the late-‘60s, there were two ways bands could make the British Invasion style their own. American bands like The 13th Floor Elevators and Count Five took what the Stones were doing and threw it in the gutter. English bands went a little lighter and became more psychedelically conceptual and glam. In 2008, Detroit’s own The Good Things take the latter road on their latest record, Side 1. With songs like “You’ve Got Me High� and “Sleepin’ Around,� the band sounds like they put their music through guitar pedals that are labeled “T-Rex,� “Beatles� and “Slade.� Nice harmonies, nice falsettos and smooth guitar riffage. Solid jams. — ERIC ALLEN - Real Detroit Weekly