GZR - Ohmywork

By Korgüll The Destroyer - Metal for Supper - The Afternoon Edition - 05/10/2005

If you are looking for a band that recaptures -- or simply mimics -- the glory days of Black Sabbath, don’t bother with GZR. One might be inclined to expect that founding member and Black Sabbath bassist Geezer Butler’s project to be a rehash of times past, but this album is actually quite modern.

This is fairly straight-up heavy metal, no fancy sub-genre to stick it into. Album opener “Misfit” is a simple, catchy, fast-paced song to bang your head to. Even then, it isn’t that fast. Most of the songs move at about a Metallica ballad-esque pace, which is fine since the faster songs tend to be the weaker ones. Tracks like “Pardon My Depression” and “I Believe” are the most interesting and engaging, while “Pull the Strings” and “Dogs of Whore” provide some catchier songs for the record. The emotion is pretty well-delivered throughout the album, and although it never gets really intense, they do all sound quite genuine.

After having listened to the album a few times, even the parts that were annoying initially have become less so. The rapping on “Prisoner 103” is rather grating at first, but eventually becomes tolerable thanks to the chorus of said song. The electronic-like female vocals at the start of “Pseudocide” are also quite irritating, but not nearly as much as the chorus that follows. Luckily, this is the shortest song on the album and is easily either skipped or ignored. These few unpleasant moments don’t detract too much from the whole thing, fortunately.

Butler certainly won’t have a hand in redefining music with this project of his, but that would be expecting far too much anyway. GZR is a band that is aware of the musical climate that it exists in, and is not a sad or embarrassing attempt to recapture or rehash glory days long since past. Not perfect, and hardly groundbreaking, Ohmwork is still a decent and enjoyable album. While I wouldn’t encourage you all to run out and buy the album right now, I don’t believe it deserves to be brushed aside without a second thought.

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