AMG Review of Five Hundred Pounds [Jive]

Roch Parisien
All Music Guide

Led by Toronto's subtle-guitar whiz Gordie Johnson, Big Sugar cover a dizzying number of bases on their second effort. The group kicks out the jams for a pair of mutant, acid blues in "Ride Like Hell" and "I'm A Ram," stokes a hypnotic, National Steel groove on "Sugar In My Coffee," wails out a lurching Tex-Mex riff for "AAA Aardvark Hotel," and fascinates with an open-prairie/R&B fusion on "Wild Ox Moan." Impossible to pigeon-hole and freshly uncentered.