EDMONTON -- Welcome to another exciting edition of Who Named the Band?

Our special guest today is the Goo Goo Dolls, which assaulted the Jubilee Auditorium last night with the kind of jingle-jangly, meat 'n' potatoes, salt-o'-the-Earth rock show that doesn't pretend to be art, just radio-friendly hits from the "3F" school - fast, furious and formulaic. Maybe that is the art. A full house of young women and their boyfriends stood from the first note: the songs that goes "I wanna wake up where you are."

General agreement was detected among the female audience members as they fawned over lead singer Johnny Rzeznik and his faithful sidekick, the leprechaun-like bassist Robby Takac. Never mind the band - who named the band members?

You could say this crowd was "ga-ga over Goo Goo."

Yes, what a silly name. It's just about the worst band name in rock 'n' roll.

You see, these guys didn't intend to become rock stars. They came from a humble, workin'-man's background where you knew who you were, girls were girls and men were men. They have values, knew the value of a hard day's work. They were a bar band long before they became rock stars. They didn't have time to think up some artful name. They had gigs, man. They needed to play. The Goo Goo Dolls would do, and now they're stuck with it. As befits their middle-class roots, this band plays rock 'n' roll as if plying a trade, carpentry, perhaps - hammering out hit after hit after hit, middle of the road rock aimed to please, nothing fancy, just building the show from the ground up, pre-fab piece by pre-fab piece.

There were, however, some initial problems with the foundation, to beat our metaphor into a bloody paste. A poor sound mix coupled with Rzeznik's appalling lack of stage presence was an unpleasant shock off the top. It was clear in the first few songs that he was just going through the motions. His vocals were weak, he missed cues, mumbled words and wanked through guitar solos that were nothing but a series of cliched riffs strung together at random, the sort of thing you might hear in the guitar room at a music store. He seemed dazed. His three sidemen, meanwhile, pounded out generic, middle-of-the-road rock grooves bereft of feeling or subtlety. Compared to record, it sounded like a bad cover band playing Goo Goo Dolls songs. Takac, who made up for his lack of vocal gifts with entertainingly manic energy and the perfect rock star smirk, was called upon to sing a pair of quick tunes every so often, songs that had a disquieting flavour of '80s bubblegum rock. So far, so bad.

Most didn't think so, of course. Gusts of feminine screams greeted Rzeznik's every move or word. The feeling was mutual, it was obvious - and perhaps it was a pretty face in the front row that gave him the extra spark he needed to drag the concert out of the dumps. He did. She did. It all worked out.

Shortly after Rzeznik spotted a particularly attractive female, he suddenly came alive in Cuz You're Gone. It was a heartbreak song, to be sure, unleashed with a passion not seen in the first half-hour of the show. The long warm-up over, more highlights followed, from Name to Here is Gone to something called Sympathy, which, said Johnny R, is "something I never want but sometimes I need."

Consider it done, man. Not a bad band (as long as we catch you on a good night), shame about the name.

I would've been happy if the Goo Goo Dolls had opened for Five For Fighting instead of the other way around.

Singer John Ondrasik and his band - including Edmonton-born guitarist Peter Thorn - were terrific. The songs were clever without being pretentious, and they even managed a touching moment in memory of Sept. 11 and didn't get all maudlin about it. The band sounded like a hybrid of Elton John and Bruce Springsteen, which isn't as strange as it sounds.

Bonus points for wearing the Oilers jersey. It certainly fits with the band name. (More on the Goo Goo Dolls)