Doug and The Slugs were a Vancouver pop-rock band led by singer Doug Bennett who came together in 1977 and released their debut album (Cognac And Bologna, which included the Top 20 hit "Too Bad") in 1980. The group consisted of Bennett on vocals, John Burton and Rich Baker on guitar, Steve Bosley on bass, Simon Kendall on keyboards and John Wally Watson on drums. Between 1980 and 1992 The Slugs (and Doug) released six LPs and a number of singles, many of which were moderate hits within Canada, but they never really cracked the big time and by 1994 all of the original members had left aside from Bennett, who continued to tour as Doug and The Slugs with a rotating cast of sidemen until his untimely death in 2004.

Wrap It!, the Slugs' second LP, was recorded in 1981 at Little Mountain Sound in Vancouver, by co-producer (along with the band) Jim Vallance and assistants Mike Jones, Patrick Glover and Kevin Doyle. The liner notes on the dust sleeve are an amusingly self-deprecating look at the process of making the album, with ironic asides about spending $100,000 on coming up with an album concept, hiring producers and engineers, recording the damn thing and promoting it afterwards. "Dangerous," both the first song on the album and my favourite, is an up-tempo, new-wavey number with impassioned vocals by Bennett. "Forget About Me" is a meat-and-potatoes rock number that just might bear a certain resemblance to, say, Huey Lewis and The News, while the slower "River" is a jazzier, more epic take on the Slugs' sound that kind of reminds me of The Rheostatics.

Dangerous
Forget About Me
River