‘Awake’: Godsmack’s Ferocious Sophomore Album

To the uninitiated, Godsmack’s initial success seemed to have arrived overnight. Sitting comfortably alongside best-selling platters from fellow alt-metal acts such as Korn, Limp Bizkit and Slipknot, the band’s self-titled debut yielded multi-platinum returns in 1998, while its 2000 successor Awake introduced the Massachusetts alt-rock stars to the Top 5 of the Billboard 200 for the first time.

The headlines, though, distort the true picture, for Godsmack’s commercial breakthrough was actually extremely hard won. First forming in 1995, the band initially endured a hand-to-mouth existence, gigging relentlessly in and around Boston and recording the original version of their debut album (originally titled All Wound Up…) on a shoestring. Indeed, it was only after Republic Records remixed, remastered and reissued All Wound Up… as Godsmack that the band’s fortunes significantly improved

Nonetheless, vocalist and prime mover Sully Erna was determined his band’s sophomore set, Awake, should retain the metallic grit and the sonic attack of their earliest music. Republic offered a much bigger recording budget and a choice of potentially upmarket studio complexes, but Erna and company instead converted an old warehouse in Haverhill, Mass., into a makeshift studio to capture the songs for Awake without compromise.

For his part, Erna believed that he needed “to stay close to the streets” to ensure his band’s music wasn’t diluted. Ultimately, he succeeded in this aim, for Awake contains some of the most ferocious music Godsmack ever committed to tape. “It’s not very polished, it has a very raw edge to it,” Erna told Billboard at the time of the album’s release. “But it still has a lot of good grooves, and it still has a lot of power.”

“The studio had a very large drum room,” guitarist Tony Rombola added in an interview with Planet Guitar. “This allowed (bassist) Robbie [Merrill] and me to set up our amps and record the songs – together with (drummer) Tommy [Stewart] and Sully – in a quasi-live setting.”

Crucially, Awake’s best songs also had enough melodic appeal to balance out the muscle and volume – and that meant it could build on the success of their self-titled debut. Issued as the album’s lead single, the intense, yet dynamic title cut topped Billboard’s Mainstream Rock chart, while its successors “Greed” and the intensely powerful “Bad Magick” also scored Top 20 success on the same poll.

The official video for “Bad Magick” never saw the light of day around the album’s initial release, but following a remaster it finally received its HD premiere on YouTube to mark Awake’s double-disc vinyl edition in May 2024. In this video clip, Erna recounts an extraordinary story from the original shoot: while on set, he hugged record label executive Jeff Panzer so hard that he cracked two of Panzer’s ribs. After being taken to the hospital, Panzer was advised not to fly while he recovered. At the time, he had been scheduled to board a flight on September 11, 2001, but because of his injuries, he postponed the trip and changed his flight to a later date.

Elsewhere, the eerie, sample-heavy “Vampires” received a Grammy nomination, while the album’s coruscating opening track “Sick Of Life” introduced Godsmack’s music to a whole new audience after it was picked up by the United States Navy for a series of commercials during the early 2000s.

Collectively, this all helped Awake to build upon the success of the band’s self-titled debut. First released on October 31, 2000, it shot to No. 5 on the Billboard 200 and went double platinum, reserving the place at rock’s top table Godsmack went on to maintain during the 2000s with subsequent best-sellers such as 2003’s Faceless and 2006’s IV.

Reflecting on the success of Awake in a Planet Guitar interview, guitarist Tony Rombola later put it down to a combination of hard work and Godsmack’s collective intuition as musicians. “We’d been playing together for quite a while [by then] and we tested and performed the material from Awake in all sorts of situations,” he said. “To see how they’d be received, we regularly incorporated most of the songs into our live set. That gave us an opportunity to rehearse them extensively and ensure we were in peak condition when the time came to record.”

Shop for Godsmack’s 25th anniversary of Awake on vinyl or CD now.