Solace is an American heavy metal band from the Asbury Park, New Jersey. Formed in 1996 by the remaining members of Atlantic Records artist Godspeed, Solace is most well known in the stoner rock genre, but as guitarist and founding member Tommy Southard has said "We're not a stoner band, we're a rock 'n' roll band—a hard rock band, a metal band." This idea was reaffirmed by iTunes.com in 2010 when they voted the band's third studio album A.D. "2010 Metal Album of the Year". However, their live performances at stoner rock festivals such as America's Emissions from the Monolith and Europe's Roadburn Festival, have rooted them just as deeply in that genre. Biography Godspeed years In 1994, the band Godspeed went to Electric Lady Studios to record their Atlantic Records debut album Ride. Featuring future Solace members Tommy Southard and Rob Hultz, Godspeed's major label run included a cover of "Sabbath Bloody Sabbath" for Nativity in Black: A Tribute to Black Sabbath with Iron Maiden's Bruce Dickinson, tours of the United States and Europe with Black Sabbath, Dio, Cathedral, and Sugartooth, as well as a music video for their single "Houston Street" featured on MTV's Headbangers Ball and Beavis and Butt-head. The birth of Solace Godspeed dissolved after just one album, but following stints as lead guitarist for both Sugartooth and Slap Rocket, Southard reformed the band in 1996 with Hultz and former Glueneck singer Jason, naming the revamped outfit Solace. After a 1997 demo, Solace released their self-titled 7" debut in 1998, followed by 1999's Distanced from Reality EP, a split with fellow New Jerseyans Solarized. Soon afterwards, the band released its debut LP, 2000's Further. A cover by metal art veteran Wes Benscoter (Slayer's Divine Intervention) hinted at darkness within the album, which was quickly considered a departure from the stoner rock pigeon-hole the band had already been put into. 13 and beyond In 2003, the band released the follow-up to Further, its second album 13. Artist, fan, and friend of Solace Paul Vismara created the album's cover. Considered by some to be musically superior to its predecessor, 13 helped Solace further define themselves as more than simply stoner rock, assisted by the vocals and guitar work of doom metal guitarist Scott Weinrich on the track "Common Cause". Soon after the release of 13, the song "Indolence" was used on the soundtrack of the popular video game