Orange Goblin - Coup De Grace
Rise Above
Stoner Metal
13 songs (53:41)
Release year: 2002
Orange Goblin, Rise Above
Reviewed by Khelek
Archive review

The fourth album from UK stoner metallers Orange Goblin is yet another journey through super distorted riffs and gravelly vocals, but unfortunately the same old song and dance starts to wear thin this time. While the band still shows their ability to write some catchy songs, they do not really attempt to do anything different and it sounds like you're listening to the same old thing that was presented on the previous two records.

The first track, Your World Will Hate This, opens with some fast, distorted riffs that we've all heard many times before, nonetheless it's a good, energetic start to the album. The vocals sound a somewhat aggressive and the guitar work sound great as well, albeit simple and repetitive. Monkey Panic keeps this fast pace, but once again it's just not a very original sounding arrangement. In fact from the first few tracks it sounds like you're getting the same album again; not hearing any improvement whatsoever. Rage Of Angels opens with samples and then an immense, foreboding riff that gets my attention, but unfortunately the song just drops it and goes back into the usual simple, repetitive riffs.

The sound on this album is again very guitar-centered, and unfortunately the guitar work really fails to get my attention very much. Whiskey Leech turns the energy level up and some of the guitar leads sound great next to the heavy drumming of Chris Turner. Born With Big Hands starts out with some decent, interesting guitar work as well; nothing that hasn't been done before at this point, but it's at least a good, catchy song that can keep my attention. Jesus Beater is also a memorable track that has John Garcia (Kyuss) doing some guest vocals and they sound really good.

The only real problem with this album is that Orange Goblin have written so much material up to this point, but they have not come up with anything different sounding that can really keep the listener interested for almost an hour of music. The song structures have all been done before, and, in my opinion, better on the previous two albums. If you haven't heard Orange Goblin before, this album might sound like something pretty good, but for the listener who has heard their previous work this is not going to offer anything new or exciting.

Killing Songs :
Whiskey Leech, Born With Big Hands, Jesus Beater
Khelek quoted 74 / 100
Other albums by Orange Goblin that we have reviewed:
Orange Goblin - A Eulogy For The Damned reviewed by Goat and quoted 80 / 100
Orange Goblin - Healing Through Fire reviewed by Tony and quoted 90 / 100
Orange Goblin - The Big Black reviewed by Khelek and quoted 84 / 100
Orange Goblin - Time Travelling Blues reviewed by Khelek and quoted 84 / 100
Orange Goblin - Frequencies From Planet Ten reviewed by Khelek and quoted 81 / 100
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There are 2 replies to this review. Last one on Tue Mar 09, 2010 2:55 am
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