I’ve been wanting to talk about this album for the last 5 months, so get comfortable. Before listening to this album on spotify, please look up how to remove volume equalization. this album was not designed to be heard at bavckground level. l
I’m going to start this review off with an unusual disclosure. I’m not a casual CoC listener. They have been the band that has held court at the top of my music lists for decades. I would not be doing music journalism or photography without their influence, which lands me right in the middle of a paradox. For me to talk about this album in the context of this band, I have to compare it to the music that has had the biggest impact on me as a musician, journalist, music photographer, and music fan, judging it against music that I’ve listened to for 30 years. Think about asking a rabid Metallica fan who has spent decades wearing out Kill ‘Em All and Master of Puppets about Metallica’s new work, or asking an old school KISS fan about an album like Revenge or Psycho Circus. Musicians get stuck in their ways, but not as frequently as fans do. Familiarity often wins out over innovation. I was hopeful about the album, but tempered in my expectations.
Since the band’s last record, the CoC roster was down 2 founding members – the rhythm section, the literal building blocks of the CoC sound. All CoC had to do to is rebuild and start recording from square one, replacing a rhythm unit, and with them, write new material from scratch that stands capably with their legacy, originally performed in their musical prime, during the creative explosion of contemporaries in the mid 90’s when metal was getting major label support. What’s there to worry about?
I first heard this album in November 2025 while visiting New Orleans for a concert shoot. Pepper was kind enough to let me hear the album during my time there. Before hearing it, i didn’t know what to expect. i know they were excited about the new album, but didn’t really know what CoC was going to sound like – they’ve been crossover thrash, political metal, southern marinated stoner rock… “Sounds like Corrosion of Conformity” doesn’t narrow down the possible options.
Prior to listening to the album. i asked Jenny, CoC’s tour and merch manager, (also Peppers wife), what she thought about the album. Without hesitation she said “it’s the best thing they’ve ever done.” For the most part, CoC’s setlist has been music mostly written in the 90’s To put it in perspective, Guys who couldn”t get into non all age shows during Coc’s heyday are now old enough to babysit their grandkids. Good? Great? Those are both understandable reactions. Best work they’ve ever done is really committing. When i met up with Pepper, i asked him about the comment, and he responded as quickly as her. “That’s because it is. This is it. It’s everything ive got packed into one album. This is IT.” i wasn’t sure how to feel about that, especially with band lineup shifting so dramatically.
First, how do you replace the drummer who was the original driving force behind the band? Reed was the drummer who Dave Grohl introduced to people as “the guy who inspired me to pick up drums”. Reed was a world class drummer. There simply isn’t another Reed Mullin alive. There is, however, a Stanton Moore.
Stanton as rated as #37 on Rolling stone’s best drummers of all time list. He literally wrote the book on New Orleans drumming. His style bridges the gaps between second line drummers and jazz and funk. He drummed on the only CoC album recorded without Reed, 2005’s In the Arms of God. Moore’s rock drumming has the loping, hard hitting, boomy DNA of John Bonham. Not only can you hear his love for John Bonham in his playing, but Stanton is a student of the drums as much as a player. He understands Bonhams style and mechanics, as well as influences and what he got from each of them. Simply stated, Stanton Moore is one of the most versatile drummers I’ve ever heard. He’s a world-class drummer who showed up with all of his homework done and gave the performance of his life. Moore’s drumming from In the Arms of God changed what i thought made a drummer great. His influence made In The Arms of God unique and possibly the most musically substantial CoC album in their catalogue.
Some overall impressions of the album:
Pepper’s Voice – Pepper Keenan’s vocals sound better than they have in years. His lyrics have the same flow and bounce as they did in Deliverance and Wiseblood, but with substance of In the Arms of God. His voice sounds smoother then it has since America’s Volume Dealer 26 years ago. i stayed for the music, but Keenan’s voice is what hooked me.
The right lineup for this album – Keenan and Weatherman took their biggest liability and spun it into musical gold. I don’t think the band could have accomplished a result like this without a drummer with Stanton Moore’s chops and style. Bobby Landgraf has spent more time on stage with 6 strings than 4, but after listening to more Honky, it sounds like a lot of the dirty funky rock on Baad Man, the increased ZZ Top and Grand Funk Railroad vibes, and Leslie West influences would be right at home in a Texas boogie rock trio. He sounds great on bass – his overall musicianship fills the space Mike Dean left combined with a new energy and excitement that you can hear throughout the new album
The Fun Factor – when my wife Merry, first heard parts of the new album, she got a huge smile and said “It sounds like they’re just loving this. You can hear how much fun they’re having! ” I think that’s the secret sauce of Good God Baad Man. Fun and excitement is contagious and can’t be faked. 2005’s In The Arms of God is a masterpiece, and it marked a new level of artistry and technical skill for the band which continued into 2018’s No Cross, No Crown. 2000’s America’s Volume Dealer didn’t have the power of In The Arms of God, but it had a lot of personality. It sounded fun and made you have fun when you listened to it. I would consider AVD my favorite album on the strength of its vibe and versatility. Skill is huge, but there’s a reason musician’s catalogues are strongest early in their career, at their least experienced. Music that grabs you by the soul isn’t about musical skill as much as passion and energy. With age comes less excitement, less energy, less willingness to take chances. bands who have accomplished things don’t want to ruin what they have with an album that doesn’t connect. It feels like the longer a band is around, the more they have to lose and the less chances they take, often choosing a path that keeps the sound consistent and fans happy enough, but the fire that drove them in the beginning fades over time. 2026 CoC has a different energy than i’ve seen before, and it makes them sound more like a young band on the way up, teeming with talent and fresh ideas, with the technical sophistication and musical experience to back up their vision.
Behind the scenes Warren Ryker has worked with Keenan previously on Down II. Keenan and Moore also worked with him on Anders Osbornes masterpiece and comeback album American Patchwork. Ryker was the right guy for this job. The fact that Ryker kept referring to the album as “the Dark side of the Doom” shows you the ambition he had for it. He understood the assignment and he delivered in spades. Social media has provided us peeks into the recording of this album, and you can see the excitement to be playing and writing again.
This album sounds fearless. If this isn’t a breakout album in waiting then I don’t know what it is. It seems impossible in the face of so much change, but it’s happened before in music. Bands have lost foundational numbers and thrived in its wake. AC/DC’s Back in Black“, Fleetwood Mac’s Rumors, and Deep Purple’s Machine Head were all albums that shouldn’t have happened after bands lost franchise players. For a band who has rebuilt itself musically multiple times by shedding convention and, as Keenan puts it “putting their dicks on the chopping block” has always been one of CoC’s best tricks. there’s certain things you could take for granted with CoC. Same guitars, same backup guitars. John Custer as producer is another. This is the first album not produced by Custer since 1985’s Animosity. This tour is the first one i’ve seen the band ask about what songs people want to hear live. I think the setlist is going to be the next sacred cow on the menu.
New Orleans music scene – New Orleans is experiencing a massive jump in interest in Thrash, Doom and Sludge metal. if there’s ever been a time to have a breakout album ready to drop, now is that time. headliners of European festivals this year looks like a roll call of the New Orleans scene.
The Verdict? This album is going to shuffle my desert island album list – there are no bad songs on either album, and no filler at all, instrumentals included. Any one of the songs could be released as a single. No Cross, No Crown had a lot of great parts, but for me it never stood as more than the sum of those good parts. Good God Baad Man draws you in with almost a cinematic feel. The album feels like a two part story. The first and last songs of the album are absolute monsters. You have a few times in your life where you get an album where every song just hits for you and the next song always feels exciting like your favorite song is coming up. i think this is already my next one – i think it’s their most impressive body of work to date. This album is a home run so out of 5 stars, this gets a solid 4.5. Why not 5? that’s Zeppelin IV, Sabbath Vol.4, Master of Puppets territory. Once in a lifetime albums. This album may just be in that rare air when you’re 10 more album listens in. Everything else is almost finding reasons to quibble. For example, as much as i enjoy listening to all of the songs, I do find i get stuck around Swallowing the Anchor. Swallowing the Anchor it’s a great song, but the only reason for that is that by that time I’ve been thinking of the last song on the album, Forever Amplified, which i can’t get out of my head. Forever Amplified deserves it’s own review by itself. Other than that? There were a few places in songs that i think would have had little Mike Dean flourishes, but it didn’t feel less without, just less familiar. Good God Baad Man is an ambitious album that will likely blow fans (old and new alike) out of the water.
Keep in mind when i’m describing sounds and songs, i’m talking about my feelings, observations, and connections.
Song by Song Brekadown:
Good God – The first 4 songs feel like they’re one continuous piece of work. They all have their own style and sound, but the space between songs is tight, and there are a few fades and returns in the songs themselves that make transitions between songs feel less noticeable. it’s a block of music that gives you a chance to steady yourself again.
The song pulls you forward by the collar and feeds you another haymaker before you steady yourself from the last one. The first and last tracks of the album were the ones who caught me from the first listen.
Good Go/Final Dawn starts off with a rolling start with single guitar like Stonebreaker from In the Arms of God. The song hits like a no-knock warrant. it reminds me of the colossal energy Soundgarden brings in songs like Superunknownand Searching With My Good Eye Closed. The magic of ITAOG, were massive sounding songs like “Never Turns to More”, “It Is That Way”, “So Much Left Behind” and “Stonebreaker” that felt like juggarnauts taking off, flying through the air, building tension. The vocals take aim, dive bomb in, and blow your mind. By the time the vocals hit, you are hungry for that full energy of that song. You can hear it on the first track “Good God Final Dawn”
You or Me has the impact of a song like “Never Turns to More, with forays into a Monster Magnet-like Space Rock at the end. This song’s vocals sound like Wiseblood era Keenan. His voice is stronger than it’s been since America’s Volume Dealer; it’s got the smoothness and versatility of him in his prime.
Gimme Some Moore tumbles out of “You or Me” with Keenan shouting “IT’S ME, DONT SHOOT” and feels like the fight after the aforementioned no knock warrant. Al Jorgensen (Ministry) and Monte Pittman(Prong/Madonna) singing backup. it has Metallica”Battery” energy but with a punk backbone. A copy of this should be offered to every hockey locker room and Irish bar that wants rage on tap. The song is one drunk person away from being a bar fight. This was about the point where at my first listen i turned to Pepper and said “This is what it sounds like recording an album with rabies”.
The Handler is a dark, Groove driven, wild-eyed pissed off rock song. It has that Ozzy vocal style where the vocals creep out and stick to the song word by word in the verses and sound like they’re being ripped out of the song and shot at you. It changes up from the fury of the first three songs without giving up any of the energy – it’s the sound of somebody taking every ounce of drive and rage and shoehorning it into one song. If you
re counting, we’re only on song 4 of 14.
You get a breather during Bedouin’s Hand, a drum driven bridge leading into “Run For Your Life”. You can hear the fresh blood in this. When I asked Pepper why they chose Bobby Landgraf, he answered me during this song. “That’s Bobby on guitar”. Bobby was the right choice for the next stage of CoC. He adds something inspired, blending with the sounds that have made CoC the band that they are. It is a great summary of the album, familiar but unexpected, with a new infusion of energy and delivery.
Run for your life, running 9:11, Is the story of a soldier deploying into a valley that he never leaves. it’s a song where the whole band is a single unit all landing together on the one, like “Voodoo Chile”, “Kashmir”, and Soundgarden Classics like “Slaves and Bulldozers”.
Speaking of Soundgarden, the spoken word part at the end that sounds like a story told by an army veteran was performed by Jason Everman. Yes, THAT Jason Everman. Not everyone knows about it but from the first time you hear about him, he sounds like a plot for a movie. Did you ever notice that Nirvana Bleach has two guitarists on the front cover? One of them is Jason Everman. At the time, he was a member of Nirvana. He was the one who ponied up the $606.17 it cost to record Bleach. Sadly it was not to be and Everman and Nirvana parted ways in mid 1989. By late 1989 he had found a new gig as the bassist for Soundgarden which lasted until mid 1990, but things just didn’t gel with Chris Cornell. Jason Everman did what any reasonable man who has been in two of the world’s most influential heavy bands, joining the Army where he spent 12 years as a ranger, later becoming a Green Beret.
The entire second album plays to the other side of CoC – some of my favorite COC material is the sawdust on the floor, juke joint rock and roll stuff. it’s what made CoC different. with songs like “Wiseblood”, “Albatross”, and most of their 2000 album America’s Volume Dealer. Album 2 starts off with the other title track:
Baad man. It’s a funky, bluesy ’70s Rock foot-stomper. If I win the lottery, I want to have CoC walk behind me Pootie Tang style, playing this as I strut around, feeling my baadest. “Gimme Some Moore” might be one drunk guy away from a bar fight, but this song is one drunk guy away from a bar fight soundtraack. Break glass in case of Fi-yah.
Lose Yourself – funky, like “Zippo” and “Doublewide”, but integrated with a heavier ITAOG version of “World on Fire”, with an industrial sounding beat in the background. it has more of that ‘huge song with vocals perfectly positioned to dive in and light the fuse’ of the song I spoke of earlier in the first tracks.
*Speaking of “World on Fire”, if you ever want to hear the difference between Reed and Stanton’s styles, look for the AVD “World on Fire” Demos. Reed is playing on it and it sounds like a whole different song, but they both kill it.
Mandra Sonos is a bright fun sounding instrumental that relaxes the mood and makes you smile, then it steals “NIB”s girlfriend and sets you up for the musical ball punch that is…
Asleep on the Killing Room Floor – as intense as “Vote With a Bullet” but has a feel more like the First songs in Soundgarden’s “King Animal”. Rhythmic and driving and relentless in a way that pulls you in and holds you in the song. They’re not exploring new space with this song. They know this landscape, they’re going after it with a new fire and creativity and taking no prisoners while doing so. The new video from Mike Holderbeast suits it perfectly, with gritty black and white images that Eyehategod has used so well. It sounds like CoC’s slippery southern rock while being strapped into an electric chair.
Handcuff County – This is a deep fried southern dose of bluesy texas rock. The album should be issued with a six pack of Corona and one lime to be opened prior to listening. It flows like musical molasses – it’s the kind of song that doesn’t deliver unless you sell it, and CoC gave it the right sound to put it right over the (ZZ) Top.
Like the first 4 songs on Good God, they’re all great songs individually but as a continuous block they merge into a different level of art. They connect the way the first four songs do, but with a different feel. Instead of a no knock warrant it feels like massive and funky roadhouse Rock. With these songs there’s stretching their classic guitar rock legs.
2026 CoC seems to have expanded past nods to Skynyrd and captured some of the Allman and ZZ Top swagger and have hopefully lit a funky bluesy classic vibe that they will carry into further albums.
Swallowing the Anchor continues “Handcuff County”‘s juke joint swagger, combined with “Deliverance” style CcC Style. It’s a solid song that taps your foot and nods your head for you.
Brickman – I admit, that I’m likely reading my personal experience into this song, but music is about connecting and seeing what you need to see in the song; there are so many classic rock songs about going home. “Home Sweet Home”, “Mama, I’m Coming Home”, or “Solsbury Hill”. The tale of a man worn out and tired from the road has this power of reaching to the familiar, returning to where life is. Having been the guy on the road at various times in my life, they appeal to me. What they don’t do is describe what happens when you get home. Life continued while you were everywhere else – bodies get tired, life gets old, and souls get weary. This song feels like the hard man on the road landing back in his kitchen to find that home ran away from him. All that power and swagger from the last 12 songs careens headlong into fate, with life slipping away in front of your eyes, which brings us closer to what I consider to be the crown jewel of this album.
Before we start that, lets talk about Jelly.
Anjelica “Jelly” Joseph is one of the vocalists for Stanton Moore’s Galactic. She is fantastic to watch and listen to. I have to admit, her showing up on a COC album was not on my bingo card, but i’m so glad she did. She closed this album out with one hell of an exclaimation point.
Forever Amplified This is CoC saying goodbye. This song feels like a requiem, a mass for the dead. It’s a goodbye to Reed, a goodbye to Lemmy, a goodbye to Pepper’s dad, who died last year. Most songs about someone leaving you or leaving the world sung with a quiet grace, this one FEELS like losing someone.
Losing someone you love who was an anchor to your world is the feeling of the inevitable building. it’s an overwhelming feeling of emptiness and loneliness where the bargaining goes from “please no” to “please not now. I’m not ready for this” to “please not today”, to a last hope you’ll get to say goodbye for the final time. Loss is an emotion that abducts you, ties you down and makes you feel your worst fear, having to feel the profound pain of loss and the knowledge that it’s not something you’re going to wake up from. You can’t see forward, but you have the other souls in your life who love you. As much as you feel alone, you have small mercies from good people in the world that are there at the right time. People understand feel it and mourn with you… people who either have, are, or will be holding on to “please not today”. In that moment, that solace is a glimmer of light that love and the prospect of feeling happiness haven’t left the world with your person.
“Forever Amplified” is not a sweet goodbye. It’s The sound of Doom advancing. The inevitable building while your shrinking world tears apart and gets sucked into the void. The pressure gives and you hear a wail like a soul is leaving their body. The weight is still there but the pressure of dread gives way to the inevitable and the world starts moving again. The lyrics hit heavy, lasting a scant 30 seconds talking about days gone by and your last ride together while comforting yourself with the solace that they will live on in you, and voices of all the lives they touched before departing. That’s the moment you hear the voices around you singing “on and on and on and on we ride” lighting the road in front of you, lifting you while you pass an impossible line. Then you hear this soulful, clear beautiful voice yelling into the same void, sharing your pain in that moment with you, holding onto each other for dear life, making you feel like you can let go and be swept away by your own natural disaster. As the song ends you hear the last few heartbeats of the life that just ended giving way to silence.
This song hits me where I live- in 2021 I flew out to Psycho Las Vegas to do photos for some of my favorite artists. My mother was dying and she told me to get on the plane. On my transfer in LAX, I was notified that she had been moved to hospice while I was on the plane. The world felt alone with tens of thousands of my closest friends, which is something to relate to and mourn and find hope. I needed to hear something that found me where I was at – I remember watching the Flaming Lips sing “Have You Realized” and I melted into a puddle at the side of the stage. All that weight, and dread and sadness parted while that plugged right into my mind at that moment. “Forever Amplified” is the song I wish I had to, remind me that I wasn’t alone; I was part of a massive community that communicates and connects through the music we love. My mom knew it, and she wanted me to do something I loved, and make something beautiful. I shot the show of my life, and she got to see it before she passed and it made her happy too. I didn’t see her again after I got on that plane, but getting me there was the last gift she gave me. On and on we ride.
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