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It's easy to hate on new-metal dudes such as Godsmack, especially when they stick so faithfully to the dark and punishing conventions of their genre years after its heyday. Like the band's previous albums, Faceless sports a well-constructed, riff-heavy metal attack that actually grooves in places, which is almost reason enough for well-adjusted adults to suspend their disbelief over lyrics such as "Take me away from this hell I've created." But whatever novelty their sound once had has long since worn off, and the foreboding poetry and constipated howl of Wiccan singer Sully Erna are almost laughable. Even in those all too rare moments when Godsmack's unrelentingly dismal approach seems to have more brains than brawn, Faceless sounds like a nightmare that's more played-out than scary.