Ashes of the Wake (20th Anniversary Edition)

Originally released in 2004, Ashes of the Wake was Lamb of God’s breakthrough album. Their first for a major label after three indie releases (two as Lamb of God; one under their original name, Burn the Priest), Ashes propelled the Richmond, Virginia-based metal band to the forefront of the New Wave of American Heavy Metal movement on the strength of aggressive crowd-pleasers “Laid to Rest”, “Omerta” and “Now You’ve Got Something to Die For”. Certified gold in the US, it’s become their best-selling album to date. Not that any of the band members—vocalist Randy Blythe, guitarists Mark Morton and Willie Adler, bassist John Campbell or then-drummer Chris Adler—had any sense of its significance at the time. “We had no idea that it would have the kind of impact and legacy that it’s had for us,” Morton tells Apple Music. “That wasn't really a notion or consideration at all. Being our first major-label record, I didn’t really know what that meant in terms of expectations, creatively or commercially. We had some conversations with label people about that stuff, and it was a very steep learning curve for me in terms of what it meant to be on a major label and what kind of things would change with that situation being in place.” The band felt added pressure to deliver because they had only recently written their previous album, As the Palaces Burn. “As a songwriter, I personally felt pretty tapped at that point,” Morton recalls. “I had been so accustomed to just collecting music as the ideas came and not really dedicating myself to sitting down and writing songs as an activity. But with this album, we had a time window. The new label wanted their new record, so we had to abbreviate the touring we would’ve normally done so we could write a new record—essentially right after we had just written one.” Despite the time crunch, LOG delivered what became their most popular album. “I understand why it’s the record that most people go to,” Morton says. “But I don’t revere this r