I make a lot of fun of Goose. It’s been made known to me that this bothers some people. In fact, pretty much all the Goose meme pages unfollowed me (hilarious, I know, perhaps even funnier than people unfollowing me over politics). However, I’ve decided it’s time to let the people know what fuels the vitriol in my heart for the bird band – and that maybe, despite all that, I even enjoy listening to them sometimes. For context, I’ve been to 3 Goose shows all within the last 2 years (one with Ben [drummer 1], two with Cotter [drummer 2], all pre-Jeff [percussionist] departure), I’ve streamed and listened to at least two dozen shows on Nugs, and I have a number of fairly Goose obsessed friends. So I like to think I’m qualified to make my case here, which can be summarized in a few points:
- The jams are repetitive, there is very little variation in style or length (does every song need to be 20 minutes long?), and most importantly they do not transition on the peaks. I will dig into this point later, as I think it demonstrates best my issues with Goose’s jamming.
- It’s the Rick [lead guitar/vocals] show. Share the stage for Christ’s sake. It’s like he forgot how to play rhythm. Peter [keys/guitar] occasionally gets a little keys or guitar solo, but rarely does he truly lead and build the main jam. It’s just Rick endlessly noodling. And don’t get me wrong, I love his playing. But you’re a band. Play together.
- The singing is not so great. I’m sorry. But it’s true. And that is the case for a lot of great jambands, so not too many points docked here.
- Whatever went down when Ben left the band, it seemed ugly, and I get the sense they sort of hung him out to dry. No idea what happened with Jeff so I’m not gonna place judgement.
- They like being teased. I mean, they must, or it must be part of their PR strategy. It’s possibly the only explanation for posting dorky shirtless pics of them playing frisbee in the park, or posting videos where they look like they are all checking each other out (why are they always shirtless?) or in general their – let’s call it unique – approach to social media.
- Most importantly: there is a fun rivalry between Goose and Billy Strings. It’s like Phish and Panic. It’s not that deep. As a dedicated member of the Home Team, I do my part.
I’m going to try to not just make this a straight comparison to Billy Strings, but since most people reading this are probably BMFS fans I’m going to draw some parallels as examples. Now let’s go bird huntin’.1
1. The jams are stale.
The first thing to talk about here is song length and structure. Their most recent show on nugs at the time of writing (which I am currently listening to, as I write) is from 2/15/25 in Montreal. Set 1 is all of 5 songs with lengths around 9 min, 18 min, 12 min, 11 min, and 24 min. Set 2 made it to 6(!) songs with the shortest being around 9 min. Just hear me out. Spafford was one of my favorite bands for a while, and they do a similar thing. But they would get into the pocket and stay there for a while instead of endless noodling, really being patient, and Brian Moss [guitar] is one of the most interesting players to listen to on the scene, whether he’s playing rhythm or lead.
As I said, the biggest issue here is that Goose doesn’t get into that groovy pocket and let it ride for a while. Maybe for a minute or so, and then Rick is taking off for the next 15, with like 3 separate peaks until the song just fizzles out. Now these blissful Rick-led jams are a lot of fun, especially when actually at a show.2 But they start to get a bit old when each jam sounds the same. Unless there is a tremendous amount of variation in the jamming, a 10 song jamband show can be kinda brutal. One of the things I like the most about Billy is that he mixes in tons of shorter originals and covers – in fact, not jamming everything to 15 minutes allows him to play way more covers – but also does the big jams. It adds an element of mystery and excitement to the show, you never know if you are gonna get a really jammy show or a more trad one, but it’s always awesome. With Goose, you know exactly what you are going to get every time: 2.5 hours of masturbatory guitar noodling and if you’re lucky some arpeggiated synth.
My biggest problem here isn’t even the jams themselves – like I said, they are enjoyable – but they just peak a few times, then it fizzles and gets all spacey and quiet for a moment, and they transition into the next song. I don’t think I’ve ever heard Goose transition on a peak, or even transition through a more drawn out sort of rhythmic transition (i.e. getting into the pocket for a while as the song slowly changes and then busts right into the next, more similar to the Dead or Panic). For me, that is the most unforgivable sin of Goose’s music. Maybe I’m just a freak who loves a good transition. Maybe I’ve been spoiled by Billy and co’s flawless peak transitions at extraordinarily high speeds and levels of coordination.3
I think it’s an important part of the art of “jamming,” though, not just the jam itself, but how the band transitions in and out of it. And you have to wonder why they don’t do this better. I imagine transitioning on a peak is quite difficult and requires a very high level of full band unity. Is it not there? What’s weird to me is that they are quite tight as a band. Always in time, never flubbing notes, clearly paying attention to each other during jams. And yet, no tight transitions, or really any at all. So, I have a theory, and it has to do with point two:
2. It’s the Rick show.
I guess Rick Mitarotonda and Friends doesn’t quite have the same ring to it, huh? I don’t think I have to expound on this point too much. Yes, he’s good. Yes, he’s the frontman. But Rick is a selfish player. Almost every jam is built by him, and while the rest of the band certainly plays an important part in ramping up the energy, they almost never get center stage. Just give me one long jam with Pete on the Rhodes or the Wurlitzer. Get into that pocket. Let Cotter go wild. Turn Jeff [bass] up in the mix. The rest of the band is super talented, but they just never get a chance to really show it. And honestly it bums me out, because I’d love to hear them really let loose and get creative. A perhaps perfect demonstration of my point here, is in a genre somewhat defined by long drum breaks, the last time I saw Goose, the only drum solo was maybe 20 seconds long and featured Jeff on like a single cymbal. They had a percussionist for years but practically never let him play! Listen to some old recordings or videos and see if you can even hear the percussion.4
This is why I think they are incapable of a real jammy transition. The band is just too based around Rick’s playing. You need a truly special level of band “hive minded-ness”, for lack of a better term, to do this well. Billy and his band clearly have it. The Dead had it. Panic has it. Phish has it. Umphrey’s might have it the most. I’m not sure Goose does.
One final point, as this usually gets thrown in my face when I bring this issue up – yes, Billy plays a lot too. However, other members of the band get the spotlight maybe just a little less, they occasionally sing songs, they lead and build jams, they trade leads back and forth, all that good stuff. And yes, Billy is the center of attention (and plays solo for parts of shows sometimes), but at least he’s honest about it – the band is called Billy Strings, not “Eagle” or some shit.5
3. The singing is bad.
To be honest, in the jam world, it’s pretty decent. And I actually find the way they use auto-tune as an instrument of its own pretty cool. Maybe I’m just not really a fan of Rick’s voice. But it’s a lot too indie and often out of key for me. To each their own.
4. Ben?
For those that don’t know about this little piece of jamband drama, Ben, the founding drummer, left after almost 10 years, in December 2023. Personally, I think he was kicked out, or maybe it was mutual. There were some rumours about someone else in the band sleeping with his fiancée. Who knows. I don’t really care, to be honest. But I think part of the statement he put out afterwards speaks volumes to everything I’ve said so far:
“Long term creative comradery demands personal evolution. It demands consistent communication, mutual empathy, and a willingness to compromise. Even though this is something we tried, these elements fell out of sync, which is where we find ourselves today.“6
Sounds to me like Ben wanted more creative input (maybe he wanted to actually get more creative with his drumming, shocker), and got Rick-rolled7. I think this is more evidence (beyond the seeming incapability to transition well despite being excellent players and having good chemistry) of it being The Rick Show, apparently both on stage and off. I googled Rick to figure out how to spell his last name, and I think the search results speak for themselves here (highkey hilarious that that’s the second link to show up):
5. They like being teased.
This is more about their entire marketing approach, but first I’m going to present a series of images from their Winter Tour instagram posts – if you wanna see the really egregious shirtless shit you gotta go back a bit further – but these get my point across just fine.
Why? I have lots of questions, but let’s just start with that one.
A big part of my issue with this stuff is it just feels forced. Like haha look how silly and goofy and quirky we are.
Yikes.
This one is the worst and I think warrants some discussion. First off, it’s just kind of cringe and overly silly like the others. But the post is…a big ad for Lyft. Like, I get encouraging your fans to get to and from the show safely, not drive under the influence etc. But wildly, they don’t even mention that in the post! It’s literally just an ad. A big complaint about Goose from the beginning from lots of folks in the scene is that their music feels “corporate”. Kind of bland, possibly funded by BigJamBandTM (Pete Shapiro8 for the uninitiated), studio versions sound vaguely like indie christian rock, etc. I never really bought into this – but posting straight up ads for companies like Lyft that take pretty serious advantage of their workers is kinda heinous and certainly does not help their image as seeming “corporate”.
I like Billy’s approach to social media. Random livestreams of him smoking weed and picking, pre and post show pictures that don’t feel forced, and a setlist post after every show. It feels authentic and not over the top. Can’t say I feel that’s the case with Goose.
6. There is a rivalry here.
Like it or not, for a while, if not still, Goose and Billy were the hottest rising young acts on the scene. Phish fans tended to migrate more towards Goose (given how derivative the music is, makes sense) and Panic fans more towards Billy (given how awesome the music is, makes sense). A fun rivalry developed. Some people have taken it far too seriously. Maybe I have (feel free to let me know if you think so!). But guys. I run a meme page. I write for fun. It simply is not that deep, I’m making myself laugh, and I go see Goose every time they come to town. But now you all know what inspires my Goose memes! Below are some of my favorites. Hope they give you a chuckle too.
Thanks for reading folks! More to come soon. Have an excellent week filled with jams of your choice…as long as it’s Billy mothafuckin Strings.
- No, I am not encouraging violence. This is simply a genius and hilarious play on words and reference to an excellent Turnpike Troubadours song. ↩︎
- I will say, I’ve always had fun at the shows I’ve been to. It’s fun music. Just all sounds the same. ↩︎
- This level of precision is perhaps best demonstrated by the Livin’ Like an Animal > New Country Blues from 6/19/23 [nugs] . ↩︎
- Then listen to Panic and the difference becomes quite clear. ↩︎
- First bird that came to mind. Actually it was Pigeon but that one is already taken by an even more mid jamband. What is it with bird names? ↩︎
- Full post from Ben here. Full statement from the band here. ↩︎
- See what I did there? For more on Ben, read here. ↩︎
- Dude’s a big shot in the jam band promoting world, and a lot of people think his money is what propelled Goose to such elevated heights. I don’t know. Here is his wikipedia page if you want to know more. ↩︎
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