The Times from Shreveport, Louisiana • Page 44

THE TIMES SE FRIDAY, MAY 21, 1999 Not much surprised on Godsmack's first effort ing is immature cliched and repetitive. All that said, I've got to tell you about the good stuff. The band experiments slightly with some electronic sound effects on a couple of songs, most notably Time Bomb. The guitar work during bridges and solo lead-ins is interesting. And occasionally the band proves it can change tempo and style, particularly on Now or Never and Stress.

The best example is Immune. Godsmack shows some actual melody range and variety. The best song on the album probably is WJiatever, a song that takes breaths, then powers forward. You can almost hear the musical gasps before the all-out gui-tar-and-bass sprint of the chorus. And on Voodoo, the band totally goes against the grain with funky guitar and percussion.

Thick vocals mesh with a mysterious groove that drives this extremely interesting song along. It whet my appetite for more. Iet's hope Godsmack experiments a little for its sophomore effort. Of course, you don't have to take my word for it. You can check out Godsmack, along with opening bands Punishment and Disappointment at the Malibu, 420 Commerce Shreveport.

The show will start about 7:30 p.m. Saturday. Tickets are $10 in advance and $12 at the door. You can get advance tickets at the Malibu, CD Warehouse on Jewella, The Fun Shop on Marshall and Modern Primitives in Longview and Texarkana, Texas. Call the Malibu at 221-1981.

Shannon Coleman writes about music for The Times. She can be reached at 459-3244, by fax at 459-3301 or by e-mail at livingthetimes.com By Shannon Coleman The Times To paraphrase a friend of mine, one song does not a good show make and it can't save a mediocre album either. Godsmack, the band that headlines a three-group show Saturday at the Malibu, falls into that category. I'll go ahead and tell you now that I would hesitantly recommend buying this album, That's if you like hard modern rock. If you don't, just enjoy the single Whatever on 99X.

(You know the one: "I'm doing the best I ever didI'm doing the best that I The majority of the songs on the group's self-titled major label (RepublicUniversal) debut are anthems for disaffected youth. They drown in guitar and drums. Lead singer Sully Erna has the growling affectations of a Rob Zombie-esque vocalist during his choruses. "All drum tracks recorded by Sully," say the CD's liner notes, and he wails on them with wild abandon. And like most of today's harder-edged modern rock, the songs have few surprises.

The songwrit- udbug Madness AV -SSC Bossier A festival site Downtown zLS The Times Album reviews courtesy of wire reports. Ratings: 4 (buy it now); 3 (buy it soon); 2 (buy it if you're a fan); 1 (don't buy it). fop RICKY MARTIN Ricky Martin Columbia, Ricky Martin is the studly, swivel-hipped former Menudo member who established himself as the leader of the new wave of Latin pop when he stole the show with a fan-tastico performance of his 1998 World Cup anthem The Cup of Life (included in a Spanglish version here) on this year's Grammys. The onetime General Hospital co-star's first album in Knglish builds on that momentum with its mucho caliente skasalsagarage-rock single Livin'lM Vida Ijica, and takes no chances from there, including collaborations with hired-gun hit-makers Desmond Child, Diane Warren and Jon Secada. Martin duets with Madonna on the superb William Orbit-produced acoustic-techno ballad Be Careful (Cuidado Con Mi Corazon) and sings sincerely with Swedish star Meja on Private Emotion.

He can't miss: This is cheesy, breezy, mass-appeal pop with a kick, and Martin's sure to be a household name before summer's out. and finding crossover success with their once-ubiquitous single, O.P.P., New Jersey rappers Naughty by Nature stopped making records for four years (during which time member KayGee signed Minneapolis' Next to his new label). Also during that time, the hip-hop world was rattled by the deaths of the Notorious B.I.G. and Tupac Shakur (who was a close friend of Naughty leader Treach), and the tropes of gangs-ta rap started to lose their spiritual and commercial viability. Mind you, NBN are basically nice guys, and Nature's Fury is 100 percent misogyny-free (Treach has been with Salt 'n Pepa's Sandra Denton, a proud womanist, for years).

In the face of new flux and old loyalties, NBN has struck a deeply bittersweet balance between harder-core gangsta-inspired stuff, seduction-jams and Top 40-friendly dance-party tunes. This is a big, serious, mature album, technically masterful and historically aware, haunted by ghosts of the dead yet somehow lacking the idiosyncracy of real innovation. The macho stuff comes first, including Live or Die (featuring Master Silkk the Shocker and Phi-ness). On the Run, a Public Enemy-style rant against crooked cops, is the best of this section. Would've Done the Same for Me is the album's heart; built on a slow, piano-driven groove, it's a heart-broken but unjaded anthem to friendship.

pck THURSDAY 11 a.m.: Festival opens. Noon: VIP crawfish eating contest, Main Stage. 5 p.m.: Cajun Cousins, Main Stage. 6 p.m.: Lynn Campbell's Bluetopia, Swamp Stage. 7 p.m.: Cajun dance contest, Main Stage.

8:30 p.m.: Denial, Swamp Stage. 9 p.m.: Chubby Carrier and the Bayou Swamp Band, Main Stage. 11 p.m.: Festival closes. FRIDAY 11 a.m.: Festival opens. 4 p.m.: Nomads, Swamp Stage.

5 p.m.: Cajun Cousins, Main Stage. 6:30 p.m.: Jerry Beach Blues Band, Swamp Stage. 7 p.m.: Cajun dance contest, Main Stage. 7:30 p.m.: Chubby Carrier and the Bayou Swamp Band, Main Stage. 9 p.m.: Bluebirds, Swamp Stage.

10:15 p.m.: Wayne Toups aad Zydecajun, Main Stage. Midnight: Festival closes. SATURDAY 11 a.m.: Festival opens. Noon: Felton LeJeune and the Cajun Cowboys, Main Stage. 2 p.m.: Men's crawfish eating contest, Main Stage.

2:30 p.m.: The GBU's, Swamp Stage. 3 p.m.: Sheryl Cormier and Cajun Sound, Main Stage. 4:30 p.m.: The Wunderdogs, Swamp Stage. 5 p.m.: Crawfish calling contest, Main Stage. 5:30 p.m.: Mack Manuel, Jessie Lege' and the Lake Charles Ramblers, Main Stage.

7 p.m.: Cajun dance contest, Main Stage; Southern Tradition, Swamp Stage. 7:30 p.m.: Beau Jocque and the Zydeco Hi-Rollers, Main Stage. 9:30 p.m.: BB Major Blues Band, Swamp Stage. 10 p.m.: Terrance Simien and the Mallet Playboys, Main Stage. Midnight: Festival closes.

How about a refreshingly decent album? It's been three long years since we've heard from Sponge, the group that looked to become the Motor City's first breakout rock band in ages, and did. With 1995's Rotting Pinata and its pair of dark-tinged radio hits (Molly, Plowed), the quintet unveiled an utterly distinct sound, muscled its way into the crowded modern-rock field and made itself Detroit's darling. But rocky times ensued: Progressive album Wax Ecstatic, released the following year and sprinkled with odd cross-dressing references, scored rave reviews but found the band's sales dropping. Sponge nearly splintered after an aborted European tour with Soundgarden in 1996. And last year Columbia Records dropped the group from its roster.

It would be romantic to say New Pop Sunday sounds like the cathartic rebirth of a beleaguered band, but no such luck. Sure, there's sporadic optimism to be found among Vinnie Dombroski's taffy vocalisms: True love always waits," he sings on Times. "I hope you'll be mine." But as on the first two Sponge records, a dark undercut rent shifts nervously beneath the music; there's something familiar about the razory, menacing guitar riff that slices through Pollyana, a tale of obsession that finds Dom-broski begging. "Did you bring your diseaseThat makes me breathe?" From the get-go, the album works less off the surreal swamp-glam blueprint set by Wax Ecstatic than off the one that marked Sponge's debut: a swirling cascade that bridges the blister of Detroit rock with the melancholy of late British new wave. Still, when all is said and done, the sound falls somewhere squarely between the two.

SUNDAY 11 a.m.: Festival opens. Noon: Sheryl Cormier and Cajun Sound, Main Stage; Bobby Graef, Swamp Stage. 2 p.m.: Women's crawfish eating contest. Main Stage. 2:30 p.m.: Children's crawfish eating contest, Main Stage; Steve Wells Dixieland Band, Swamp Stage.

3 p.m.: Felton LeJeune and the Cajun Cowboys, Main Stage. 5:30 p.m.: Mack Manuel, Jessie Lege' and the Lake Charles Ramblers, Main Stage. 7:30 p.m.: Kenny Bill Stmson Band, Swamp Stage. 9:30 p.m.: Beau Jocque and the Zydeco Hi-Rollers, Main Stage. Midnight: Festival closes.

Shuttle service hours: Thursday: 10:30 a.m. 11:30 p.m. Friday: 10:30 a.m.-12:30 a.m. Saturday: 10:30 a.m. 12:30 a.m.

Sunday: 10:30 a.m.-midnight. Shuttles will leave from Pierre Bossier Mall and Mall St. Vincent every 30 minutes on the hour and from the festival site at 15 minutes before and 15 minutes after the hour. The last shuttle will leave the site 30 minutes after closing each night. SPONGE New Pop Sunday Beyond, it it it A smash debut disc, an odd tjofl witfi qjivens rr what next orSporrge? NAUGHTY BY NATURE Nineteen Naughty Nine: Nature's Fury Arista, HaVrng Vbrt Gfatrnrlylrf liM.