At the tender age of 14, I watched Bachman-Turner Overdrive stomp around on Don Kirshner's Rock Concert , and I was thrilled. BTO's mullet-headed riffs were just what the puberty doctor ordered. As the years passed, my appreciation of them never waned, though my estimation of their talent did. They took "roll" out of "rock & roll," reducing it to its leaden essence, narrowing the lyrical scope to the include only the music itself (we wanna rock, we like to rock, we rock good). To an adolescent male, this was heaven; by the 80's, all hard rock would be like this. In the 70's, though, BTO was the butt of jokes.

The proof is in the Canadian pudding, though, and if you stick to the hits, BTO tastes pretty sweet. "Let It Ride," "Takin' Care Of Business," "Roll On Down The Highway," and "You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet" pack a melodious wallop. BTO's ballads, such as "Welcome Home," ham-handedly juggle pretty verses and plodding choruses, but the results can be a gas. The Anthology is for guys who bought all the LPs back in the day. BTO's Greatest Hits... So Far (Remastered Hits) is for guys who just listened to the radio.