With a serious new disc headed our way from Godsmack, fans of Modern heavy music are understandably reaching a point of rabidity. Everyone who has snagged an early listen to Faceless is raving about heightened levels of crunch, and a sound that can only be described as steroids for your stereo. The characteristic catharsis that constitutes an encounter with Godsmack is -if anything- more present than ever.
What is surprising, however, is a melodic and thematic depth that emerges from the midst of the sonic explosions. Toss in a persistent trance/ tribal undercurrent and you have a sound that doesn’t fit into our convenient rock categories. But it is surely what rock needs right now, and on this rock the band stands to make some serious headway toward becoming a permanent fixture in the world of Heavy music.
One has a fearful vision of the members eating raw steak with their hands tied behind their backs between sessions. What I found in bassist Robbie Merrill is a very level-headed man with an almost religious devotion to music.
Tim V. Parker: Like all musicians you started out doing any gig you could find. Now you're filling stadiums and getting nominated for Emmy awards. That has to feel pretty good.
Rudy Merrill: It is truly awesome!
TVP: Does it always seem real to you or do you have to step back and let it sink in once in a while?
RM: It's real. But you set goals your whole life, and you've always been put down. You finally reach those goals and you get signed and you tour. You're playing in front of all these people. You realize it, but it's after you're done touring and you take a break that you sit down and become aware of how much you've accomplished. When you do it you're just doing it. And it's awesome when you're doing it. Then we were at the Emmys and were seeing the scene and all the stars. Then you go home and that's when you say. "Wow!"
TVP: There's a lot of flat-lining going on in music right now, songs with no content, repeating themselves over and over, with no depth. A few bands are offering more than that, and Godsmack is one of them. What goes into that?
RM: We're all accomplished musicians. And Sully is unbelievable. He impresses me every day. I don't know how he does it. It blows my mind. And I think that we're a team. We set goals and we know what we want. And when we get what we want on tape, that's when we let you guys listen to it. We have four musicians who are capable any kind of music. We came up listening to Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath and Aerosmith. Now you have the new technology with the cabinets and heads and stuff. Roll it all together and that is what you get.
TVP: Godsmack is one of the few bands around still capable of shocking the establishment, but it doesn't seem that you're objective is to do that, or is it? Is it a byproduct of the themes you choose?
RM: If we write a song that calls for a guitar solo, that's what we do. Or if we require a funky drum beat, that's what we do. It depends on the song; it depends on the mood of the song. In terms of what we do it's important to the band, and especially Sully, that we sing about things that are important to us and mean something to us. We can't do something we don't have passion for or can't relate to. So you end up with a little but of everything.
TVP: You mentioned, Zep. Sabbath, and Aerosmith. These are the people who laid the foundations. There are now two generations of musicians who have emulated what they did. How would you say it's done right?
RM: I remember back in the early nineties, Helmet and Pantera did it right by putting their own thing into it, and for us, we've been playing for ages, so it's natural to us. But it's more than just the sixties and seventies influence, there's decadent dance and tribal beat and all that stuff. For us, we love all types of music and we're able to write some stuff that's us, that's nobody else’s. We're lucky that people like it.
TVP: Godsmack can be as heavy as it gets and still encompass Post-Grunge.
RM: A lot of it has to do with the drop tuning. What we're doing is nothing special. A lot of it is written by a drummer, so it's mostly percussive. Then you drop the tunings down, and it makes it all the heavier.
TVP: Whom are you listening to now?
RM: Right now?
TVP: These days.
RM: I was listening to Faceless. We're about to go on tour with it and rehearsals are starting. Lately I've been listening to Mudvayne, and I'm still into A Perfect Circle. I can't wait 'till their new album comes out.
TVP: I'm going to say that there's a new aesthetic in modern rock around the core of Tool, Mudvayne, and Godsmack, that incorporates a Pagan outlook.
RM: We do what we do. Tool is an unbelievable band, I've heard some stories about how they do their thing and it's totally different than us. When you're an accomplished musician and you get together with other people, you never know what's going to happen.
TVP: I saw you perform at Woodstock '99. What memories do you have of that experience?
RM: It was funny, because we had toured all summer with the Ozzfest, so the day before we were in San Bernardino playing in front of 50,000 people. We took the Red Eye into New York and to us it was just another gig. There was a lot of hype on management's part trying to get us in but to us it was just Red Eye and playing to a bunch of people. But once we got out on stage, there were all kinds of press, and we looked out onto the crowd and it was just unbelievable. You got up for it.
TVP: How do you gear up for a new project in the studio.
RM: This time we rented a place in Miami Beach, and we lived together for five months and prepared the songs. I knew exactly what I had to do before I went into the studio. I had my effects together. There was a song I was playing the fretless on, so I had to do some work with that. I was mentally preparing myself for it so that when I got in there I could wipe it out pretty quick.
TVP: Your last disk, Awake, was done entirely on the road. What's better, incorporating the energy from the road, or hunkering down like you did for Faceless?
RM: Our first CD, [Godsmack] we had a lifetime to work on it. We had no experience of writing on the road like that and we pushed it through. I personally liked Awake. For where we were and who we were at that time I thought it was awesome. But the best result is to have time off, get your shit together. Maybe get away from the band for a bit, then get together, live together and write. That way there's no other pressure around you, nothing else going on.
TVP: Three disks on a major label is a lot these days.
RM: I was panicking a little after the last one. It didn't sell as much as the first one. But the label is really backing us. They know we're a hard working band. They gave us some time. There was no pressure from this one. We believe that we did well, and they're happy with it too.
TVP: Most bands don't get the opportunity to grow while they're releasing material.
RM: We do the best that we can each time. We're true to ourselves. We just hope that the public likes it. In the back of my mind is that a lot of bands release their second or their third CD and it doesn't do well. Godsmack is a really good team. There was no stress. We knew that if we took the time we'd give them something that they'd be happy with.
We're not doing what most bands are doing right now, and people want to hear what we're doing. If people didn't want to hear it any more we wouldn't have this opportunity. While people want to hear us, we want to give it the best that we can.
TVP: And you're obviously not using a formula for "the sound." You're experimenting.
RM: We've all been playing for a long time. We've developed our ears. My bass sound is totally different from any bass sound out there.
TVP: You're using a Sans Amp MIDI box?
RM: I have, but right now I'm using an SWR Overdrive with four twelve cabs.
TVP: It's a very fat sound.
RM: Thanks!
TVP: A lot of bass players are going for the high end slap-
RM: I have that too. There's some tricks of my trade so that you can hear my note, and feel it.
TVP: How has the whole experience effected the way you work as a musician.
RM: I consider myself a team player. I don't think that if I were I'd be in the band. Nor would the rest of us.
TVP: What advice would you have for a musician just starting out now?
RM: Keep on playing. Practice. Take lessons. Find a band. Never give up. Never quit. Have a dream. A goal. Try to reach it.