Proud Like a God [Enhanced] [Import]

Editorial Reviews
Album Description
Dutch edition of alternative metal act's debut album. Inclu des one track not on the American release, 'Suzie' & features the hit single 'Open Your Eyes'. 12 tracks in all. 1997 release. Standard jewel case.

Tracks:

Open Your Eyes
Maria
Rain
Lords Of The Boards
Crossing The Deadline
We Use The Pain
Never Born
Wash It Down
Scapegoat
Get Busy
Tribute

Customer Reviews:

Great Music. Not your best first choice of the apes........2005-05-30

I have nine Guano Apes CD's. The Planet Of The Apes has the cream of the crop, which is where I would point ANY first time buyer of the apes. If you already know & like the apes, I assume you already have a working knowledge of their offerings. I have an unusually wide spectrum of musical interest. I LOVE "Quality" wherever it may be found. My collection includes, Tapping The Vein, Die Happy & Lacuna Coil. I even like The Lords Of Acid once in awhile. But as of late, Whenever I feel the need for un-leashed raw female power & expression, I reach for "Planet Of The Apes", it Frosts My Cake. Expand to other Guano Apes CDs AFTER you've experienced them. Breathe in the aroma, kick the turds around awhile, get to know Land Of The Apes, first.

Worth the cash.... .......2004-10-24

What a great band. This disc is worth the price for Open Your Eyes alone. You will not be disappointed. Walking on a Thin Line is their best, but I recommend them all.

This album rocks.......2004-10-03

Unlike most people, I didn't buy this album cause there was a bat on the cover or cause I only wanted it for the song "open your eyes". I bought this album cause I knew it would be an awesome album and I was right. It's a hard rock album that can get really heavy at times where it's almost metal. The music is all well done and diverse which can sometimes be a problem for some hard rock groups (they just play simple chords and notes at high volume) but not in this case and the vocals are great. Some people might be put off by a woman being behind the mic but this is no ordinary woman, Sanda Nasic has a very unique voice. She can sing sweetly at a low volume or she can open up with a melodic scream that works perfectly with the music. All the lyrics are very well written as well. I think this is a great album for someone that's looking for a different hard rock group with some real talent.

Hidden Treasure.......2004-07-26

I found the Guano Apes because Open Your Eyes was on the soundtrack of a Warren Miller movie. The energy of that track alone convinced me to find the album. The vocals have a bit of an Ozzy quality, circa his mid-to-late days with Sabbath. I was surprised to find such a diverse collection of song styles on the rest of the album. Personally, I was hoping for mostly hard tracks like Open Your Eyes, but I found most of the other tracks to be pretty good. None of the other hard tracks live up to the promise of Open Your Eyes. There is something that says almost to me when I listen. The softer tracks are actually more compelling and better performed. I gave the album the fourth star based solely on Open Your Eyes which, with any US airplay, could actually earn this band commercial one-hit wonder status (so far), at least on hard rock stations. If you are put off by the mixed reviews of this site, but like hard rock, try to pick up a used copy online, there are plenty available, cheap. Open Your Eyes will do just that.

Some good, some otherwise.......2004-01-14

Guano Apes' "Proud Like A God" contains a selection of excellent songs that rock with real power and authority. "Open Your Eyes" - probably the best track here - is a raw, thundering chunk of thrashing rock. The music on this track is powerful and could overwhelm a lesser singer, but the lead vocalist easily out-shrieks the instruments, to fantastic effect.

The rest of the CD is hit-and-miss. "Maria," "Rain," "Never Born," and "Scapegoat" are all well-done songs that vary between hard-rocking anthems and slower ballads. "Lord of the Boards," "Crossing the Deadline," "We Use the Pain," and "Get Busy" aren't very good at all. The jaw-droppingly stupid lyrics on "Lord of the Boards" (regarding an alien snowboarder) are some of the more asinine lyrics I've heard in a song in quite some time.

"Tribute" is an enjoyable song, at least for the first 5 minutes. The final 4 minutes consist of random noise from the various instruments, including the lead singer. It sounds like some sort of terribly misguided attempt at free-form rock/jazz noodlings (complete with plenty of feedback), and it's completely unlistenable.

Tracks:

Balm in Gilead
Chassidic Chant
Quiet Flows The Don: From Border To Border
Quiet Flows The Don: Oh, How Proud Our Quiet Don
Elijah, Op. 70: The Lord God Of Abraham
The Purest Kind Of Guy
Joe Hill
The Peat-Bog Soldiers
The Four Insurgent Generals
Native Land
Song Of The Plains
Cradle Song
Within Four Walls
By An' By
Sometimes I Feel Like A Motherless Child
John Henry
Water Boy
My Curly Headed Baby
Mah Lindy Lou
Wagon Wheels
The House I Live In
Showboat: I Still Suits Me
Sylvia
Showboat: Ol' Man River
Porgy And Bess: It Ain't Necessarily So

Amazon.com

There was nothing like the Robeson sound, ever. To describe his deep, rich, perfectly equalized instrument is futile. Go instead to "Balm in Gilead," the opening track, and see if you can listen to the last pianissimo phrase without falling to pieces. Robeson was at his best when the music was slow and the words contained spiritual or social messages. Faster, lighter fare like Kern's "I Still Suits Me" or Gershwin's "It Ain't Necessarily So" find the serious-minded singer out of his element, lacking irony and swing. "Old Man River," though, gets a simple, dignified treatment. It's Songs of Free Men, though, that will just keep Robeson's artistry rolling along, especially in Sony's astonishing transfers. --Jed Distler

Customer Reviews:

Robeson on wax.......2007-06-19

I found this album in a thrift store last week, for a couple of dollars. It's the original pressing on four 78 RPM records, in a gatefold format. It's in pristine condition. I really bought it for the incredible cover art, although I hope to be able to listen to it in this format at some point.

The voice, the sound quality and the interpretation.......2004-09-24

Put this on your stereo and if it is good enough the depth and richness of Robeson's voice will make your fillings rattle and your chest rumble. The power of his voice is awesome. This CD is superbly recorded with no audible noise at normal listening levels.

A Voice from the 40s, often dated, often moving.......2002-09-01

"Red diaper babies" have greeted this disc with nostalgic joy, and it captures a time and an aesthetic and a political belief with precision. Anyone interested in the emotional life of the pro-Soviet left of the 1940s should buy this disc. It's something like Henry Wallace set to music. There is much more to Robeson than that, however, and Sony has given us Robeson whole: there are songs by American masters of the musical, there are labor songs, religious songs, as well as the kind of faux-folk songs which the butcher supreme Josef Stalin encouraged and which were not taken seriously inside the USSR (except at gunpoint!!) but which were taken up by dupes around the world. This is Robeson at his least savory - willing propagandist for a vile mass murderer. Songs such as "Native Land" (fittingly, Robeson is referring to the Soviet Union) and the Red Army song are the equivalent of the "Horst Wessel Song", anthems of murder, and it is difficult to listen to the worst of them without retching. On the other hand, Robeson's commitment to American folk culture was real. "Balm in Gilead" is deeply beautiful; "John Henry" is heroic; "By an' By" is both resigned yet hopeful. "Joe Hill" captures an era in labor history. Anyone interested in American popular song should hear these. Turning to Broadway, his "Old Man River" is very fine, though Robeson changed the lyrics for political reasons and Leonard Warren has done the song better. I disagree with the editorial reviewer: "I Still Suits Me" is wonderfully playful and shows Robeson using his gorgeously rich voice to tease and poke fun. However, Marc Blitzstein's "Purest Kind of a Guy" is beyond saving - another example of Robeson recording an unworthy song by a political fellow-traveller. Ugh. But for every miss there are two hits. Robeson performs Mendelssohn's Elijah with nobility, and sings his favorite song, "Water Boy", with joyous pride: "There ain't no hammer that's on these mountains that rings like mine, boys, that rings like mine."
No one need have any fears about the mono sound quality. The orchestra in the second half of the program is at times a little dwarfed by Robeson's voice, but it generally sounds clean and colorful, and the great artist's voice rings like no other.

Robeson at his best.......2000-05-12

It's hard to believe that most of these recordings pre-date the advent of magnetic tape: the CD transfer is superlative. The songs and performance are beyond reproach. Notable is the imaginative packaging in miniature 'record album' format, complete with the original cover art, and a replica of the original Columbia record label applied to the CD.

In response to a previous question: Robeson's performance of Danny Boy (Londonderry Air) can be found on the Vanguard LP entitled "Robeson" (VRS-9037).

some of the greatest songs of the last century.......2000-05-05

In the 1940s, before rabid McCarthyism and racism had taken its toll on him, Robeson made these wonderful recordings of spirituals, classics and pop tunes. Accompanied by the solo piano of the incomparable Lawrence Brown, or by an orchestra, the songs ring out with pride, dignity, skill and unmatched integrity. The shameful treatment that Robeson was subject to from American authorities certainly seem grotesquely absurd to a modern listener. The wonderful version of "The House I Live In" included on this cd should forever kill off any suspicion that Robeson did not love his country deeply. This album ought to be heard by millions of people, world wide. Robeson's voice is nothing less than a glorious high point in 20th century music, and it's hard to think of any recording capturing it to greater advantage.