Ok, I have to say it. Rob Zombie shocked me in ’99 when he very nearly smoked metal maestros Black Sabbath off the stage in the summer spectacular that once was the Ozzfest, and, as of this writing, he has - surprisingly - done it again with his new disc, “Sinister Urge”. Without a doubt, this CD is a firm step up from 1998’s “Hellbilly Deluxe” which, now that I think about it, was no slouch itself! Although rather short (the album clocks in at about 38 minutes) by today’s two-good-songs-and-a-bunch-of-filler standards, “Sinister” packs a wallop from the get-go, and rarely lets up. I was surprised, because the first radio single “Feel So Numb”, which is probably the album’s low point, gave absolutely no indication of the ferocity contained in this recording.

”Sinister” starts off in typical Zombie horror show style, with creepy organ music and an old hag from one of Rob’s favorite movies telling us that we’re all “sinners” and that we’ll surely burn in “everlasting fiery hell”… well, we already knew that, Grandma! But yeah, she’s probably right… fortunately, when we get there, we can just say Rob Zombie sent us! (Please Satan, I was only kidding…)

From this disturbing preview of things to come we get dumped right into “Demon Speeding”, the album’s first actual song. Not sure what it’s all about, but when I listened to this tune while driving I ran several stop signs, and also got a verbal warning from my wife! What can I say? It kills…

Rob has a couple of interesting guest stars on Sinister, in addition to his enormously crunch-oriented band of regulars. Right off the bat, on the album’s third track “Dead Girl Superstar”, I heard the unmistakable sound of a cat being strangled, and I knew it had to be Kerry King of Slayer! Yeow, Kerry, let that kitty go! Ok…well, on every album, Rob has to touch base with all the dead chicks he’s known, usually with spectacular results. No different this time, this track is a high-speed smoker!

But even better than Kerry’s six-string caterwauling, Mr. Zombie scores with an appearance by none other than the man who started it all, Ozzy Osbourne. The two metal mavens deliver the goods, big-time, on “Iron Head”, a track so amazingly heavy, I just keep going back to it for that delicious ‘fix’ that so very few heavy metal songs can provide these days… stuff like this is why I’m growing my hair long again!

Sometimes, I wonder if Rob actually records this music in Hell… I mean, when you put this CD - or any other CD by Rob Zombie in for that matter - in, it takes a normal cheapo car deck and seemingly transforms it into a top-of-the-line Pioneer model - no matter how much you turn it up, it just sounds better and better! It’s almost like your volume knob is somehow connected to the Universe itself, you know? No matter how much you crank this sucker, the deep metal bath you find yourself immersed in just gets sweeter and sweeter, it just comes at your ears from all directions. For sure, this disc was designed with high volume in mind, so be sure to take advantage!

Ok, where was I… um… “Go To California” is pretty cool. “Feel So Numb” is so-so… “Transylvania Transmission” is just a bunch of horror-movie excerpts and weird samples strung together, not really a real song… I guess if you take away the intro piece and this track, there are only nine songs on this CD? Yikes! It doesn’t matter, though, because the good far outweighs the bad in this case. God, isn’t it icky when I ooze over a CD?

Moving into the home stretch, three tracks remain. “Bring Her Down” is right up there with “Iron Head” for best track on the album, in my ever-so-humble opinion. The orchestral parts are just awesome, the lyrics are cool too: “Come on! Bring her down - to my world baby. Come on! Take a look at the world that’s around you, baby”… now, that’s deep!!! “Scum Of The Earth” is cool too, not a great tune like the others but not bad either, it’s like half of an old Zombie song mixed with equal parts of an old Motorhead song! Hit the ‘skip’ button? No, not at all!

Things wrap up in so-so fashion with “House Of 1000 Corpses” which is another sound-bite heavy number. It’s really cool, though, how Zombie digs up these old movie blurbs and imagines a way to seamlessly incorporate them into his music. I can’t think of any other artist that does it to this extent, and I hope he keeps right on doing it, for a long time to come. Rob Zombie… might need a nice soapy shower, but everything else, he’s got under control!!!