Review Summary: While many will say this isn’t good, this is one of my favorite non-metal albums, with underrated singing and musicianship that isn’t tapped into its full potential.
Ah Godsmack,the band that started my long journey into the hard rock scene which led into my love of metal. Faceless was the first album I picked up from these guys, and instantaneously, I was addicted. Awake, their sophomore effort, was the second album I picked up, and is one of my two favorites of theirs.
Awake first three tracks blend so perfectly together that when I first heard it, I thought it was all one song. Starting out with the excellent Bass line by Robbie in
Sick of Life, it turns into an all out headbanging fest. A top five all-time Godsmack song for me right here. Even though the lyrics are not as great as I thought when I was 15, they still make you pissed off. Secondly, we have
Awake. Now unless you haven’t listened to the radio since 2000, or watched a single Navy/Army commercial, you have heard this song. Starting out with a blazing riff, this song is more relentless than Sick of Life was. My personal favorite of the song is during the middle section and during the solo, a great solo by Tony in my opinion. The last part of this trio of greatness is
Greed. Again, like the two song prior, this is full on assault on one’s head
Songs four and five;
Bad Magik, and
Goin Down are fillers for me. Nothing special about them at all and it kind of bring the album down. Mistakes though, bring the rut to about ground level now. At first, I hated this song, but it grew on me and the song is pretty addicting. Again, there is nothing special like the first three songs, but another solid song.
Trippin starts out really slowly with Sully singing in a lower tone of voice before exploding into a great vocal line. Sully to me, is such an underappreciated singer, and I think he is just fantastic. The energy he puts out after the slower parts of the songs is quite spectacular.
Forgive Me is quite strange for a couple reasons. Throughout the whole album, the songs have had a dark, gloomy mood to them with the instrumentation to back it up. Forgive Me changes the formula with Tony doing guitar parts reminiscent of Faceless, basically, this doesn’t sound like the Awake method at all.
Vampires is an instrumental track that earned the band a Grammy nomination. The lyrics are a bit strange and Tony seems like he is playing the same riff over and over again, and just adding solos into the mix. Tommy shows skill on the drums with beats that sound a bit like their hit Voodoo in some portions.
The Journey is another instrumental, but it leads into my third favorite song on the album,
Spiral. In the same vein as Voodoo because this is indeed a ritual/tribal song, there is no doubt about it. Like Trippin, the verses are sung slowly and Sully explodes during the chorus, which is the best on here. The song ends with Sully doing a chat of “Fly……Fly…..Fly Away…..Fly Away Again”
Godsmack’s Awake is their darkest, dreariest, gloomiest album yet. Ranging from songs about hopelessness and depression, to being reborn again via reincarnation, there are some pretty deep lyrical moments on this enjoyable album. While many will say this isn’t good, this is one of my favorite non-metal albums, with underrated singing and musicianship that isn’t tapped into its full potential.
Personal Favorites:
Sick of Life
Awake
Trippin
Spiral
