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For a long time, heavy-metal singers were required to have glass-shattering falsettos. Then came Metallica, Nirvana and Alice In Chains and, in addition to everything else that changed, metal singers went much, much deeper.
"That whole thing just kind of flipped over to give people like me an opportunity to be singers," said Sully Erna, frontman for the platinum- selling Boston metal quartet Godsmack. "If everyone was like that guy in Stryper, I wouldn't have had an opportunity to do it. Nor would I want to!"
When that high-pitch singer from the Christian- rock band Stryper was all over MTV in the '80s, Erna was a teenage drummer in Boston. He switched to singing in 1995, when he formed Godsmack with guitarist Tony Rambola and bassist Robbie Merrill, and the band's dark, melodic sound congealed around his deep, brooding voice.
Shift in hard-rock playlists
By the time its debut CD came out in 1997, playlists had already shifted toward Godsmack's style of hard rock.
"Radio has always been our best friend. I don't think we really pay attention to it too much, but we're aware of it when it's happening," says Erna, whose band opens for Metallica Tuesday and Wednesday at Nassau Coliseum. "It's a pretty simple formula to be able to write good rock songs. It doesn't have to be that complex - sometimes less is more. We focus on the rhythm and percussion and get people's feet tapping. Drums are the most primitive instruments, and we focus on that."
Erna, a drummer since he was 3 years old, experimented with American Indian hand-drumming techniques to make Godsmack's latest album, "The Other Side." (Shannon Larkin, the band's third drummer, handles most of the percussion.) It's a rare departure from a reliable nine-year formula of loud guitars and jackhammer rhythms, and an opportunity for the band to "show a little more versatility," Erna says.
They recorded "The Other Side," which includes acoustic reworkings of their signature songs like "Keep Away" and "Awake" in addition to a few new songs, at a studio in Hawaii. The band members and their girlfriends and kids - Erna has a 2-year-old daughter who regularly attends Godsmack shows wearing big headphones - had planned to vacation together in Hawaii until Universal Records came up with the acoustic-CD suggestion.
"We said, 'Well, you pay for our vacation and we'll do it,' and they did," Erna recalled. "The atmosphere was so serene, it was perfect for this kind of thing. It was just the band and me and we produced the record and it was a very close kind of vibe."
A book in the works.
It sounds like the ultimate pampered rock-star existence, but Erna said his life wasn't always thus. In his thick New England accent, he mentions a collection of journal entries he hopes to put out as a book later this year.
"I just didn't have a great childhood - I was involved with a lot of violence and gangs and whatever," he said, by phone from a tour bus in Hershey, Pa. "I think it's going to be a good read, especially for people who are struggling and may think there's no way out of the ghettos. If they live this life that I had they should know there's a pot of gold at the end of rainbow. It's just a son of a - getting there."
WHEN&WHERE: Godsmack, opening for Metallica, Tuesday and Wednesday at Nassau Coliseum, Uniondale. Tickets are $55-$75 and can be purchased at Ticketmaster, 631-888-9000 or by going to www.ticketmaster.com.