Customer Reviews

Godsmack

5 star:		(230)
4 star:		(92)
3 star:		(36)
2 star:		(23)
1 star:		(46)

 

 

Godsmack's self-titled debut album from 1998 packs an aggressive set of one dozen emotionally dark songs, whose mournful lyrics sung by the groups powerful vocalist Sully Erna are very expressive. Reminiscent of heavy metal favorite Metallica and grunge bands such as Nirvana, Soundgarden and 'Alice in Chains', Godsmack has combined several styles to produce a very unique sound of their own. Formed in 1995 in Boston, Sully Erna (who is a practicing Wiccan) along with with guitarist Tony Rombola, bassist Robbie Merrill and drummer Tommy Stewart first received notice when people began listening to Godsmack's single "Whatever". Popularity grew with songs such as "Keep Away" and "Voodoo". My ratings for each song (out of 5 stars) are listed below:

1. "Moon Baby" (5+). Starts softly, but suddenly awakens to powerful guitar and bass, as well as Sully's dark vocals. Guitar aggressiveness later grows, as well as harmonized vocals.
2. "Whatever" (5+). Fast-paced, very aggresive guitar and potent percussion mix with powerful & melodic vocals.
3. "Keep Away" (5). Intense guitar takes center stage with the lyrics about wanting an exlover to stay away and features a guitar solo.
4. "Time Bomb" (5). Aggressive vocals backed by aggressive guitar and percussion take center stage in this song which also features occassional silent or near-silent breaks.
5. "Bad Religion" (4.5). Grungy song marked by aggressively plucked guitar & bass, as well as strong pitch changes.
6. "Immune" (4). Slower song that begins with a spoken sample before being swallowed by Sully's very grungy voice. Aggressive guitar comes through in the middle followed by a brief instrumental interlude. Good guitar riffs towards the latter part of the song.
7. "Someone in London" (3.5). Slow, but very dark instrumental marked by strong bass and base drum. Sound effects include lightly heard screams before leading into the next song.
8. "Get Up, Get Out!" (4). Faster tempo and aggressively riffed guitar back Sully's aggressive vocals. Somewhat repetivite.
9. "Now or Never" (3). Song begins softly but quickly crescendos instrumentally with aggressive guitar and percussion before the dark vocals begin. Not a particularly engaging song as it is somewhat long and monotonic.
10. "Stress" (4). Faster and less dark song than the previous track. More engaging guitar and lyrics including a lengthy scream from Sully.
11. "Situation" (4.5). Song begins with sounds reminiscent of a squeaky wheel, but is quickly taken over by aggressive guitar and bass with Sully's wailful vocals. Good guitar riffs and solo.
12. "Voodoo" (5+). One of the best songs on the album, starting with Sully's funereal melodic vocals followed by strong percussion and bass with guitar in the background. Though the song itself is 4:40 minutes long, the track continues for another 4+ minutes of silence and lightly played percussion.

Overall, I rate Godsmack's self-titled debut album with 4 out of 5 stars. It's powerfully dark music can be listened to repeatedly without becoming tiresome. I highly recommend it to anyone that enjoys grunge or dark rock.

Don't get the 3-star rating wrong; I do like this album. But Ihave to criticize the simplicityand redundancy of the music and lyrics. The theme throughout is pretty much "I don't like you--stay away from me," and we hear it time and time again. A far cry from Alice In Chains, to be sure. But...

That doesn't mean this album isn't worth your dime. The drum work is pretty good. As for the guitar handling, well, I can only advise that you don't listen to Randy Rhoads within 12 hours of listening to this album. The guitar playing is simplistic, but it does at least move the songs along.

If you like the in-your-face guitar sound, and you tend to get, well... disgusted with some of the people around you, you may very well enjoy this album.

Yes it's true that Godsmack's influence spectrum is vast, but this foursome probably listened to these influential greats (Metallica, Alice in chains etc.) and created their own bigger and better sound to become gods of their own rage-energetic realm. This sound is alive. Not even to talk about Sully's well balanced voice seamlessly integrating with Tony's aggressive and rhythm-hungry six stringer. Their lyrics adds a further spark to the already rock solid sound. This CD has attitude written all over it. Sully, Robbie, Tony and Tommy...we salute you.

Godsmack are an awesome band, but they somehow picked up a reputation of being Alice In Chains wannabes. I do detect an AIC influence, but there is an equal influence from bands like Metallica, Tool, and White Zombie in their sound. However, they have the ability to take their influences and create an aggressive, energetic sound all their own.

Frontman Sully Erna's vocals are often very intense and confrontational, which sets them apart from their influences. Many of the songs seem to express anger toward someone, possibly an ex-girlfriend, with the resolution often being telling them to "go away". They do this in many of their songs, which might annoy some people, but I personally find it to be stress relieving. Tony's innovative guitar work (he actually can play lead, which many popular rock bands nowadays are not capable of doing) and the well oiled rhythm machine compliment the vocals and awesome songwriting perfectly. The best songs on the album (good to crank up when you're in a bad mood) are "Whatever", "Keep Away", "Time Bomb", "Bad Religion", and "Get Up, Get Out". Highly recommended if you are tired of all the trendy rock that permeates the airwaves.

Okay, so this may not be an, and I quote, "original" piece of work, but it's still really cool. Sully Erna has a great voice, managing to growl somewhat like James Hetfield (like on "Keep Away") and moan like Layne Staley (like on the enigmatic but catchy "Voodoo"). Yeah, this album's good and heavy, but the lyrics could be more far-reaching. But hey, I don't really mind. It's a good "attitude" CD, and I just love to imagine screaming those words to the people I hate when listening to this CD. "Keep Away" is, by far, the best song on here, although "Whatever" and "Moon Baby" are probably the runners-up. My only complaint is that that little media thing at the beginning of "Moon Baby" is quite obviously a rip-off of White Zombie, but oh well, it's still cool. Oh, and there really doesn't need to be an explicit lyrics label, I have CD's with worse language that don't have it. Yeah, nothing bad here, so "do like I told you" and check out this CD. It really rocks.

...and it never lets up. Although the final song on Godsmack's self-titled debut, "Voodoo", sounds soft compared to the rest of this blistering CD, it is a deeply dark dirge that probes the recesses of drug addiction and insanity. It is probably the most depressing song that ever came out of 1998. It is also one of the five greatest songs to come out of that year. No one ever said that true art had to be pretty.

To say that musically, Godsmack are somewhere between Metallica and Pantera is, however accurate, a way over-simplification of what it is like to play this CD. Sure, I may not want to hear it every day, but when I'm in the mood for something dark, deep, and heavy, this CD fulfills that part of me better than most others do (save for Black Sabbath's first 2 albums, of course). I think that Godsmack's true ability is not just how loud they can be while still remaining distinctively melodic (which they are); no, it's more in the way that they can so effectively project the dark themes in their music. They create such a vivid mood that you almost feel you can see it. You'd think that a big-name heavy-rock producer like Bob Rock or Bruce Fairbairn was responsible for evoking this masterful texture of sounds from this band. Nope, it was frontman and chief songwriter Sully who produced it: how many other metal bands sounding this good can say that their lead singer produced their debut offering?

My favorite song is actually the final dirge of "Voodoo", but "Moon Baby", "Whatever", "Keep Away", "Bad Religion", "Immune", and "Get Up, Get Out!" will also be duly (and deservingly) noted as classic rock tracks from 1998. This CD will go down in history as not just a classic, but as the one responsible for the birth of hardcore metal (some call it nu-metal) at the close of the old millennium.

I had high hopes for this band and I wasn't disappointed. Tracks like Moon Baby, Whatever, Keep Away, Time Bomb and Get Up Get Out show their heavy side, while stuff like Voodoo show they have a soft side. It's got some great tracks (like the ones I just mentioned), and other's that are still good, but don't compare to the rest, like Immune or Now Or Never.

Moon Baby: A really great opener. One of the best on here, but I prefer the first half of it. 5/5.

Whatever: A fun song to listen to with a cool riff. A lot of people like this the best. 5/5.

Keep Away: My personal favorite. The riff is very exceptional. At this point in the CD I am completely hooked. 5/5.

Time Bomb: Another awesome song with some cool guitar effects in the intro part. Now I think this CD is too good to be true. 5/5.

Bad Religion: This is when the CD starts to fall a little bit. A good song but lacks some depth, and they could have expanded the riff a bit. 4/5.

Immune: One of the weaker on here. 3/5.

Someone In London: A little instrumental track falling just above two above two minutes. Fun to listen too, though. 3/5.

Get Up, Get Off: The song that "upped" the second half of the CD. Great song. 5/5.

Now Or Never: Another weak one, but still good. 3/5.

Stress: The other song that made the second half almost as good as the first. The intro is the best. 5/5.

Situation: An okay track, but nothing really special. 3/5.

Voodoo: The slow song on here, but still great, it's got a really good harmony. 5/5.

Overall, an excellent CD (with only a couple tracks lacking something) and I can't wait for the next.

Godsmack is a band I really paid no attention to for years, even though I knew the name. Well, recently I found this album for pennies, and figured I'd check it out. Of course, after many listens I wish I'd gotten it back when. It really is a great rock album. I wouldn't call it original, but still great. To my ears this sounds like a mesh of Metallica and Alice In Chains, as some have stated before. Both awesome bands so no biggie. "Whatever" was a hit, "Bad Religion" should have been it's that good, and many others are strong as well. I'll admit my favorite is still the closer "Voodoo", but that's because it just such a damn creepy cool song. There's also a decent hidden track that's rather simple and short. Overall I'd call it a must for any fan of metal or grunge. Especially for pennies.

I would like to start off by saying this, if you don't like this style of music don't review this album. The reviews are written with the album being compared with similar albums(don't say you hate it then make a reference to slayer or a heavier band), so if you're going to hate on this album because you listen to gothic metal(oh god!), then please don't review it.

As this band was originally an AIC cover band in not's surprising that they have a similar sound. But to merely call them an AIC rip-off is just not right. This album has many more influences to it's style including Mettalica, STP, and a slight bit of Nine Inch Nails among others. To call this band an unexperimental is also a pointless comment if used negatively. Many famous and influential bands are straight forward and same sounding. The last time I checked ACDC was considered classic, but most of their songs sound very much the same and even the two different singers sound alot alike.

Alright, onto the songs. I'm not gonna give each song a rating because in my opinion all the songs are good.
The intro song for the album "Moon Baby" is an absolute killer an is a good mosh song, the ending instrumental part is just awesome.
Whatever is a good song to listen to while playing games and can still be heard on the radio occasionally.
Keep Away has a good intro and a a simple but cool solo.
Time bomb is an angry song with awesome screaming by Sully.
Immune I think is really under-rated but it has a really good heavy slow down part.
Someone in London is usually seen as being thrown in but I like it.
The next three songs (8-11) do not really stand out but are still good #10 Stress is one of my fav GS songs because of the vocals and overall stupidity(think retarded-good like SOAD's Sugar) and #11 Situation has one of my fav GS solos.
Finally ending the album is Voodoo. Probably the most famous song by the band this song is a lot more mellow than the rest of the album. This song is basically meant to trip you out while stoned.

Alright so you like this album and you'd like more. Try listening to System of a Down, Disturbed, KoRn, Three Days Grace and Drowning Pool. Also you should try Pantera as they ROCK!!! R.I.P Dime
If you've already heard these bands and liked them then odds are that you'll like this album as well.

I bought this CD on the strength of one song, "Whatever" and I have not been disappointed with the rest of the CD. I find the blend of hard music and voice-overs to be very enjoyable. This is a hard rocking CD that is going to be hard to top. The other stand out songs on this CD are "Moon Baby", "Time Bomb" and "Voodoo". This CD is a must have for Rock fans.