Format 7" Label Elektra 46546 | Length 3:45 Writer(s) Ric Ocasek | |
B-side "Got a Lot on My Head"
"Candy-O" (UK) Released September 25, 1979 (1979-09-25) | ||
"It's All I Can Do" is a song by the American rock band The Cars. It is the third track from their 1979 album Candy-O. It was written by the band's leader and songwriter Ric Ocasek, and features bassist Benjamin Orr on vocals.
Contents
Sound and genre
According to Brett Milano, writer of the Just What I Needed: The Cars Anthology album notes "'It's All I Can Do' was an affecting, straight-ahead piece of romantic pop, give or take a line like 'When I was crazy, I thought you were great.'" The track was described as "gentle" by AllMusic reviewer Greg Prato, while Hamish Champ, writer of The 100 Best-Selling Albums of the 70s called the song "laidback".
The bass lines and the G major guitar riffs have a major rock feel, but the song is softened down with Benjamin Orr's vocals and Greg Hawkes keyboard and synth lines.
Release
"It's All I Can Do" was released as the follow-up to the "Let's Go" single on September 25, 1979, backed with "Got a Lot on My Head" in the U.S. and Canada, and with "Candy-O" in Britain. Although the song did not reach the Top 20 standard of its predecessor, it reached number 41 on the Billboard Hot 100. A third and final single from Candy-O, "Double Life", failed to chart.
Reception
"It's All I Can Do" has generally received positive reception from critics. Prato said that "'It's All I Can Do' ... deserved to be a hit," while Champ said the track (as well as its predecessor, "Let's Go,") "give ample evidence of the band's range." William Ruhlmann, author of The All-Music Guide to Rock, said "'It's All I Can Do' hit as well [as 'Let's Go']", and in the Billboard review of Candy-O, the song was chosen as one of the "best cuts". In a negative review, Tom Carson of Rolling Stone said, "'It's All I Can Do' calculatedly recycles the 'Just What I Needed' hook but to less-telling effect. It's simply cold."
B-side
The B-side of "It's All I Can Do" is "Got a Lot on My Head", another track from Candy-O. In a review of Candy-O, AllMusic reviewer Greg Prato says the band "rocks out on 'Got a Lot on My Head' and 'Night Spots'".