Lamb of God - Sacrament
- Released: 2006
- Label: Sony/Epic
- Rating:
With all of the great releases that have been coming out in the past few months, it was only a matter of time before I reached the first disappointment. Sacrament, the new release from Lamb of God, is that disappointment. For a band that showed so much promise coming forth with their last effort, Ashes of the Wake, it really is a shame to see them fall this far.
I guess my first mistake was purchasing this album before hearing it, because every time I do that the album ends up being either mediocre or a complete pile of shit. As soon as the first song played, I groaned. After hearing the first single, “Redneck”, before the album’s release, I had hope for the rest of the record. Sure, the song sounds like something a Pantera clone would play, but the sounds that were in the song were something Lamb of God had never produced before, so I had hope that they were continuing in a new direction. However, the first song (and the rest of the album) is all just rehashes of old material. There is very little to speak of here if you’ve already heard Ashes.
I think the primary thing that causes this album to be a flop is the vocals and Randy Blythe in general. If you look at the previous three albums (Burn the Priest aside), there were major changes in the vocals throughout. New American Gospel had Blythe just screaming unintelligibly for the entire album, but it was pretty effective. In As the Palaces Burn, he toned down the screams a bit and went to a growling speak with screams thrown in occasionally. Finally, on Ashes, everything came together, with great growls and his awesome screams all mixed together in a perfect blend. On Sacrament, though, everything from him feels forced. It’s like he just screams for the sake of screaming and growls for the sake of growling and doesn’t use it to put an emphasis on the music that’s with him. They all just fall flat. Another problem is the lyrics. The band’s lyrics used to be pretty intelligent and well-written. On the last album, they turned into blatant political propaganda, but that was fine with me. I didn’t agree with them, but they were still written intelligently and I didn’t care about making a political statement with music as long as the music was good. Here, it’s all more political shit, and it’s not even written well. Just shit like “The government lies! Bush is evil! Fuck damn shit piss fuck!!” Seriously. Randy Blythe needs to fucking get over himself. Check out this part of his “thank-yous” in the liner notes: “As for the rest of you, (that being 99.99999999% of humanity) you are a disease on this planet, festering and rank. You are killing the earth. If I had a genetic bomb that would exterminate you all, I would drop it now.” Shut the fuck up already!
The best song on this album is “Redneck”, and I would’ve been better off just listening to that single and never picking up the album. The music is all shit you’ve heard already, the lyrics suck, the vocals are all the same. If I’m in the mood for simple stuff to headbang to, it suits me fine, but a band like Lamb of God should be ashamed of a piece of shit like this.
Farlus | 09/11/2006