Pop Music Reviews : The Godfathers Make an Offer at the Roxy

With the roiling, boiling “Birth, School, Work, Death,” the Godfathers have come up with one of the best singles of (a) this year, (b) this decade, (c) all time.

However, not every song was up to such lofty standards during the English quintet’s hour-plus performance before a full house at the Roxy on Thursday night.

Pounding down a sound found somewhere between the taut, two-fisted Anglofied R&B; of semi-legendary pub-rockers Dr. Feelgood and the crunch!- bang !-Pop! associated with the Who/Kinks/Jam, the Godfathers were never less than solid, and on such tunes as the indelibly melodic “Love Is Dead” and the Velvet-Underground-plays-Tex-Mex-riff-driven “It’s So Hard,” they were a stone gas.

The band (due back at the Roxy tonight) also had the good sense to keep everything short, so if you didn’t like the song being played, at least you knew there was another one coming along in about 2 1/2 minutes. A couple of hip non-originals--John Lennon’s “Cold Turkey” and (treading on dangerous ground here) the Sex Pistols’ “Anarchy in the U.K.”--helped, too. But douse the strobe-lights/smoke machine routine, guys.

Looking pretty spivvy in their short hair ‘n’ mohair suits, the Godfathers are one tuff little outfit, all slashing six-string razors and snarling vocals, but if they really want to be the dons capo tutti dons , they’re going to have to sell some s-e-x to go along with the heavy aggro, and--more to the point--come up with some more outstanding songs to compensate for the familiarity of the overall musical style. But you know, Boss, they just might do it. You want I should lean on ‘em a little?