There was always something apt and neatly symmetrical about a band called The Troggs scoring a hit with a song called 'Wild Thing'. Just written down it kind of reviewed itself, and when it started playing how could anybody be surprised to hear it sounded like it did (i.e. caveman wild). The same band pitching up with 'With A Girl Like You' doesn't present anything so clear cut in terms of expectations - what sort of girl would a Trogg fall for I wonder and how would they express it? Clumsily as it turns out - 'With A Girl Like You' is a pastiche of American pop played with forced restraint by a band sounding like they're halfways through an anger management therapy program. The Troggs try to moderate their usual clenched fist touch, but there's a definite heavy handedness about all this that clumps where it should float - take those 'Ba Ba Ba Ba Baaa's, usually a safe bet as background dimmer switch to lighten the mood of any pop but here they hit like errant slaps to the face. But that's ok really, I've always enjoyed the rough coyness of Reg Presley's vocal - "I tell by the way dress that you're so refined, and by the way you talk that you're just my kind" - it's the hard as nails docker sidling up to the pretty girl at the bar and forgetting how to speak for fear of looking soft. Love doesn't have to come dressed as a sonnet and 'With A Girl Like You' is no less genuine or charming for wearing hob nailed boots.
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