The Mohawk Lodge

Coming after the brilliant, slow-burning build of Crimes, the Mohawk Lodge's latest, Damaged Goods, feels like a tossed-off afterthought. The band's strength has always been singer/guitarist/mastermind and White Whale Records owner Ryder Havdale's soulful vocals, which sound largely out of place on the record's pair of barnstorming openers: "Howling at the Moon" and "Wild Dogs." "Light You Up" falls more into the mode that we've come to expect from Havdale, even if its two-minute-and-11-second runtime ends things too quickly. In fact, the record doesn't find its groove until the title track, with its sing-a-long chorus: "You can't deny that we're damaged goods." Havdale's recruited a small army of Toronto talent to his cause in recent years, many of whom appear here, including Eamon McGrath, Huddle's Clay Jones and July Talk's Peter Dreimanis, but Havdale remains the focus throughout. Clocking in at less than 30 minutes, Damaged Goods is the group's shortest effort yet. And while normally some judicious editing can help otherwise bloated releases, this record feels more like a film with missing scenes. Maybe a director's cut is in the works?