P.O.D.
Testify

Here I am facing a difficult review to write; P.O.D. is perhaps the most successful Christian Nu Metal band, having managed to leverage the commercial wave of Nu Metal at the right moment, with a couple of catchy songs and a great album: Satellite.

That the band has always been very anonymous compared to many other peers playing the same genre is clear. P.O.D. have not contributed anything new to Nu Metal, nor have they to Christian music; their music is rather banal, even though the interesting combination of metal and rap that dominated the late '90s scene with Rage Against The Machine, Limp Bizkit, Korn, etc., has often helped them.

This latest album is a confirmation of what they are, a band not without ideas but stuck in a corral, unable to escape. The album opens with Roots in Stereo, a song where rap mixes with almost reggae sounds, supported skillfully by the classic guitar riffs that accompany 80% of the production in this genre. Lights Out, a piece with a strong Limp Bizkit aftertaste, is a classic P.O.D. track, perhaps a bit too boring despite lasting less than three minutes. If You Could See Me Now is, instead, an elusive song with some post-grunge nuances, although the sounds remain unchanged.
The fourth track, Goodbye For Now, begins with an unoriginal arpeggio that seems taken straight from 'Toxicity' by System Of A Down, combined with an excellent rap that P.O.D. now feed us in every work. In the canon of engaged lyrics in Rage Against The Machine style, we find Sounds Like War, a rather fierce piece that offers nothing new compared to songs from previous albums despite some simple but effective piano riffs.

On the Grind features excellent rap, but it seems to be the only interesting element of the song, which quickly becomes banal, resembling one of those classic commercial hip-hop songs that are very successful (for example, Mattafix, Eminem, etc.). This Time, a song that begins with an arpeggio as simple as it is pleasant, is a very catchy and basic track, in the classic patterns of the group, like almost every song. Mistakes & Glories, with a fierce chorus in contrast to very calm verses where the classic two rap voices overlap properly, is adequate. Let You Down, a rather soft song, is immediately predictable and offers nothing distinctive throughout its duration. A song with an ambiguous title, Teachers, is indeed the most ambiguous of the album. Too similar to songs we've heard a thousand times both listening to P.O.D. and many other bands. The score is relative, originality zero.

Strength of My Life, another track where rap ends in reggae, very melodic, turns out to be a more modern version of "No Woman No Cry" by Bob Marley, without anything interesting. The penultimate song, Say Hello, again repetitive and too identical to the previous ones, introduces a more sustained rhythm, yet it quickly loses vigor in the ears of more discerning listeners. The concluding song, Mark My Words, is yet another identical, banal, and predictable piece from the group that can easily be mistaken for all the others.

Finally, it is an overly ambiguous album devoid of personality, but then we already knew that P.O.D. were just one of the many Nu Metal bands that exploited the genre's popularity to get known. I don't doubt their musical skill, but their compositional genius, probably only expressed with the first album and then photocopied because it proved effective. This album is just a repetition of what P.O.D. actually are, musicians closed in on themselves, who can only do what they have already done, without changing a bit.