Written By Braddon S. Williams
Corrosion of Conformity: Deliverance
With Deliverance (1994) Corrosion Of Conformity became a full-fledged Stoner Rock/Sludge Metal/Southern Metal powerhouse of a band.
Deliverance was the first C.O.C. album to feature guitarist Pepper Keenan as lead vocalist and main songwriter, and he did a fantastic job with this collection of heavy hitters that are full of great musicianship and a variety of textural shifts in both tempos and moods.
Keenan and Woody Weatherman shared lead guitar duties and combined on both crushing riffs and delicate acoustic passages, giving Deliverance a sound full of both emotional and sonic depth.
As a matter of fact, my favorite track is the mostly acoustic, but definitely sinister sounding, Shelter, with its spooky pedal steel melody lines and Keenan’s world weary voice.
The first 2 songs on the album, Heaven’s Not Overflowing and Albatross, are both crushers and other notable tracks include Pearls Before Swine, Broken Man, Seven Days, Clean My Wounds, and Deliverance.
I got to see these guys open for Megadeth around this time, and they were a killer live band, too.