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RSSWhy Metallica Can Shove Death Magnetic
I have short hair and I don’t go to many concerts anymore, but I’m lifelong metal fan. I still stand on the couch and play air guitar to music that gets progressively heavier with each passing year, and I still reflexively give the sign of the devil when I see something I like. Like any metal fan worth a salt, I’m inexplicably and obstinately defensive about the subculture that surrounds what is one of my favorite types of music. Metallica may always have a place in my collection because they advanced thrash metal by leaps and bounds with their first three albums, but to me, that band died long ago.
Instead of acknowledging the abomination that Metallica has become over the last two decades, I find it less painful to pretend that the entire band died in the bus accident that killed Cliff Burton in 1986. As delusional as it may seem, I like to think that instead of admitting the tragedy, the record company replaced the band with a set of look-alike pop divas who were instructed to do the best they could to fill the shoes of the metal giants. As time wore on, the outer metal coating wore away, and the pop divas underneath inevitably shone through. If we look at Metallica’s history, the delusion can seem more logical than the reality, and may shine some light on the reasons why I won’t get sucked into buying their latest release, Death Magnetic.
1983-1987 The Kings of Thrash: Metallica
Metallica rises out of the Bay Area thrash scene and gains popularity through fans trading tapes of their music. At their concerts, Metallica not only encourages bootlegging of the shows, but provides a special section so that fans can get the best quality recordings. The band releases three kick ass thrash albums, Kill Em All, Ride The Lightning, and Master of Puppets, but just as the band is becoming a major force in world of metal, they lose their bass player, Cliff Burton in a bus accident in 1986. Jason Newsted from Flotsam & Jetsam would be hired as Burton’s replacement, making his first appearance on the Garage Days Re-Revisited EP in 1987.
1988-1990 A Taste Of Mainstream Success: Metallica?
…And Justice for All is released in 1988, and it cracks the top 10 of the Billboard 200, giving the band its first taste of mainstream success. Although metal fans generally don’t take kindly to their bands going mainstream, they feel somewhat validated that Metallica is forcing its way into the mainstream without any recognizable mainstream support. After years of resisting pressure to produce music videos, Metallica releases a video for the song “One”. In 1990, they would win their first Grammy Award for Best Metal Performance. It would be the first of seven career Grammy Awards.
1991 Getting In Bed With Bob Rock: Poptallica
Bob Rock’s previous success as a producer for such acts as Loverboy, Bon Jovi, and Skid Row made him a perfect fit for the thrash metal giants who were destined to spend their nights winning Grammy awards and their days whining like teen princesses. He was first asked to produce Metallica in 1991, which would not only go to number one on the Billboard Charts, but would be adored by typically metal hating magazines like Spin and Rolling Stone. The album marked a distinct shift from thrash metal to bland metallic pop that would thrust Metallica into the hearts of hat wearing jocks and the thirteen year old girls who loved them. The album was commonly referred to as The Black Album because of its color and lack of title, but gains a deeper meaning in hindsight, as it was the first major sign that Metallica would kill and bury everything that made them metal to further their quest for pop stardom.
Bob Rock would go on to produce Load (1996), ReLoad (1997), and Garage Inc. (1998). He would then not only produce St. Anger (2003), but cowrite and play bass on every song on the album. While he can’t be blamed for the Metallica’s shift away from metal, their partnership with him was instrumental in creating pop based tracks like “Nothing Else Matters”. The song not only charted on the Billboard Hot 100, but proved to be almost prophetically titled, because nothing that the band produced from that point on really mattered to fans of their earlier material.
1996 Oh The Haircuts: Stone Templetallica
Long hair is a standard outsider style in metal, but if an aging rocker needs to cut his locks to hide a growing bald spot, metal fans tend to understand. Look at Kerry King of Slayer. That guy shaved his head bald, and no one thought that he was selling out. Know why? Because King continued to help Slayer rip out thrash album after album with the same ferocity year after year. King made an understandable image adjustment (a bald head still has outsider written all over it), and the fans were fine with it.
When Metallica cut their hair in 1996, it wasn’t to hide any growing bald spots. The cuts were made to emulate the “alternative” bands that were riding high on the album charts at the time, and to create a more pop friendly image that would court the mainstream press for their release of their album, Load. If their metal status were in question, this change provided the answer. To create a pop image that matched their current style of music, Metallica pushed aside their metal roots, thumbed their noses at the fans who spent years evangelizing them, and stepped into the mainstream head on. It was just a haircut, but it was also a symbolic action that broadcast to everyone what was important to them and where they stood. And their footing was well outside of the metal community that spawned them.
1998 Sue ‘Em All: Lawsuitallica
In 1998, Metallica sued Amazon.com and others for copyright infringement for selling a bootleg album entitled Bay Area Thrashers: The Early Days. This was the same band who, in the 1980’s, not only encouraged bootlegging of the tape, but built their career and reputation on tape trading. The album was simply a copy of a very early and widely circulated 1982 demo tape called No Life ’til Leather to which crowd noise was added to make it sound if the songs were recorded live. Considering that the tracks on the demo were old enough to feature Dave Mustaine on lead guitar and Ron McGovney (who never made it on to a Metallica album) on bass, it seemed like a strange thing to drag people into court over, but it proved to be the start of a trend for the band.
The following year, Metallica would file lawsuits for trademark dilution against Pierre Cardin, Cosmar, Guerlain, Victoria’s Secret, and West Mill for using the word “metallica” in their product lines. If there are two bands in the same area that are using the same name, the metal thing to do is enter into the Thunderdome arena and settle it with a fight to the death. The less metal thing to do is play under the same name until one band gives up. The least metal thing you can do is tie everyone up in court over it.
Metallica wasn’t going to court to fight another band’s use of their name. They were suing companies in unrelated industries for simply trying to use a nonsense word on an unrelated product. If your band starts suing companies in unrelated industries to to prevent trademark dilution, you need to put down the guitar, put on a tie, and stop kidding yourself about which side of the corporate line you’re on. Metallica sued Victoria Secret over a lip pencil, Cosmar over nail files, and Guerlain over perfume.
If they had still been a real metal band, I’m sure that no one would consider a lip pencil to be something that would dilute the Metallica name, but maybe these items could have been confusing to consumers when one considers the direction the band was heading in the decade before the lawsuits. If someone came out with a metallica toilet paper, someone might think it was official band merchandise and try to wipe his ass with it, as many older fans have been known to do with most of their current catalog. Metallica would then be required to upgrade their own CD booklets with quilting and doubly ply thickness, which would incur additional production cost and cut into profits.
1999 Marking The End: Orchestallica
A teenage friend once told me, “Jon, when a band gets so big that they record with an orchestra, they’re pretty much finished.” The band he was talking about soon faded away, but with the exception of symphonic black metal bands (in which an orchestra is part of the deal), I have found this wisdom to be true in every circumstance that I’ve witnessed it. Metallica recorded two performances with the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra in 1999. I know that was a while ago, but I’m throwing it out there for those people out there who are still crossing their fingers.
2000 We Make Money Not Music: Corporatallica, Inc.
I understand an artist’s right to protect their copyright on music, but it’s no secret that Metallica got to where they were by standing on the patched denim backs of tape traders and encouraging fans to bootleg their shows. Bringing a recorder into a Metallica concert was not only allowed, but encouraged when the band was in its infancy, so why, at the dawn of the new millennium would Metallica file suit against Napster and three universities claiming copyright infringement of their material? Let’s see if we can find any answers in a statement from Lars Ulrich, Metallica’s drummer from the time:
“We take our craft–whether it be the music, the lyrics, or the photos and artwork–very seriously, as do most artists. It is therefore sickening to know that our art is being traded like a commodity rather than the art that it is. From a business standpoint, this is about piracy–a/k/a taking something that doesn’t belong to you; and that is morally and legally wrong. The trading of such information–whether it’s music, videos, photos, or whatever–is, in effect, trafficking in stolen goods.”
Business standpoint? Moral arguments? Huh? Lars not only got 300,000 Metallica fans barred from Napster, but aided in getting the service shut down entirely. Ulrich had finally forgotten that they exact thing that he referred to as “trafficking in stolen goods” was what accounted for Metallica’s early worldwide expansion. It’s almost as if he was intent on making examples of his own fans just to make a buck. If there’s anything less metal than that, it can only be testifying in front of the Senate on something as pro-establishment as copyright infringement being theft, which Ulrich did that same year. If a metal band is going to testify in front of any court or government body, it better be as a defendant against some religious right wing group who claims that your music violates obscenity laws and is the equivalent of mind control.
But then, Metallica and their new haircuts weren’t as concerned with metal and metal fans as they were with the dollar signs that were constantly polishing off the rough edges that once made them giants of metal. They didn’t put together a Thrashmasters Tour with Exodus or Slayer for the metal fans that year. Instead, Metallica did a very successful tour with bands like Powerman 5000 and Kid Rock, whose mundane, ready for Billboard rock were a better fit.
2004 Some Kind of Monster: Metallijoke
The Napster backlash should’ve been the worst PR debacle that the band could hope for, but sadly, it wasn’t. In 2001, Metallica not only hired a therapist to help solve their band problems, but allowed a documentary crew to follow them around and film the entire thing for two years. The result was Some Kind of Monster, over two hours of Metallica whining like little bitches about how hard it is to be in one of the most successful bands in the world. I’d have to agree with former Metallica bass player, Jason Newsted’s assessment of the whole project as, and I quote, “really fucking lame and weak”. Know how much they paid their therapist? $40k a month. In one light, the movie is sickening when watched through the eyes of a fan, but in light of how the band sold everything that was metal down the river in pursuit of pop stardom, it’s two hours of laughing at the soft, fat, squealing little pigs that Metallica turned themselves into.
2008 Why I No Longer Care: _____LICA
Even though the pop world may use the same notes that the metal world does, the relationship between the artist and the fan is very different. Pop fans are something that an artist uses to make a cheap sale, and most of the time, everyone in the transaction is aware of it. It’s a drunken one night stand that almost everyone ends up being ashamed of in the morning. Metal, on the other hand, is a best pal with a crazy look in their eyes who, even though you know you’re probably going to end up in trouble, you jump in the Firebird with anyway.
Metallica started out like that good friend driving around with you in that Firebird. They’d drive, you’d pitch in for gas, and you’d always have a great time. As the years went on, the Firebird got less and less use, and would eventually sit rusting under a tarp in the yard after being replaced with the hip, new Escalade Hybrid in the driveway. Metallica stopped returning your calls, but if you serendipitously happened to get through, you could hear the party in the background, and knew why you weren’t invited: you were one of Metallica’s metal friends, and they had moved on to a hipper crowd.
You could practically hear them mouthing things like “what an asshole” and pointing at the phone while their cooler mainstream friends listened nearby. Sure, they would tell you that they would take the Firebird out again one day, but they would be shaking their heads “No” and rolling their eyes while their friends tried not to laugh. Eventually, you would figure out who they really were and what they really thought of you, and you’d stop calling because you knew you had been had.
And here we are in 2008, when Metallica, one of the top selling artists in the world, is looking to take the Firebird out for a spin with their latest venture, Death Magnetic, and I just don’t care. I’m a metal fan, and have been for a long, long time. Metal isn’t about fitting in. Metal is about credibility, loyalty, and shared sense of pride about being on the outside. But more importantly, metal is about the music. No matter how many times Metallica’s friends in the mainstream press tout this latest endeavor as a return to their thrash roots, I’m not falling for it. I’ve heard it all before.
Sorry, Metallica. I’m not getting sucked in to some pop pile of shit just to buy Lars a nicer pair of pants to wear to the next Grammy Awards show or Senate hearing. You’ve spent the last 20 years shining up your image and left the power rusting in the yard. In my book, you rendered yourselves obsolete when you left the average metal fan out in the cold long ago. It was calculated, it was disloyal, and it was a raving success. If I had a champagne flute, I would put it down just so I could give you a long, respectful golf clap. You made it. You are pop stars. Light yourselves some expensive cigars, play some golf, and enjoy the ride home in your Escalade. Just don’t bother calling on your metal friends, because the gates were locked long ago, and we’re screening out calls.
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September 12th, 2008 at 11:09 am
I want to give them a chance with this new one, because I’ve heard some long time, bitter fans rave about it. But I have not heard it yet so…. no opinion on that.
This post was on point, though. Am I am interpret that you are not a fan of AJFA or feel that it was a “mainstream” album? I feel like musically that was their most progressive album, period, even if the production really sucks. It just happened to be a mainstream hit, but it sounds far from pop to me.
September 12th, 2008 at 11:18 am
I thought you might enjoy laughing at this.
http://tofuttibreak.tumblr.com/post/48824984
And this.
http://tofuttibreak.tumblr.com/post/49657077
September 12th, 2008 at 11:55 am
P.S. That was poetic.
September 12th, 2008 at 2:24 pm
@K: I’m certainly not against AJFA (especially considering the song “Dyers Eve”), but and you may be right about it being the most advanced of their early material, but for some reason it’s not really one of my favorites. It could be that it sounds different than the albums before it somehow.
@Erin: Those were funny. Very nice. And thanks
September 12th, 2008 at 4:14 pm
The other day I read a local newspaper and shook my head in disbelief at seeing Trujillo quoted in an article, calling James “quite intimitading, being such a great talent”. Gee … was he paid to say that?
It would have been more accurate of him to say “James is a saddening character, having been such a great talent”, but since accuracy isn’t very lucrative … well.
September 12th, 2008 at 8:22 pm
nice post. I’d pretty much have to agree with most of that. I did get death magnetic (didn’t buy it of course, not gonna buy a new metallica album) and it surprisingly doesn’t completely suck, it’s a heck of a lot better than st. anger anyway.
September 13th, 2008 at 2:18 am
BRILLIANT! A perfect summary of what these douchebags have become!
September 13th, 2008 at 6:22 am
I don’t know about you guys, maybe i’m a bit younger but the black album was my first experience of Metallica. Nothing to this day has rocked my balls harder than when i threw on enter sandman for the first time. The riffs from sad but true, and songs like unforgiven as well. That may have been a mainstream hit but i still argue that metallica is mainstream as they get so very little radio play these days.
I suppose i’d be on the “screw newer metallica” boat if i were born a bit earlier, but to my virgin ears, the black album was something i’d never heard before. Quite the step up from Nirvana. While the “metal” status of metallica is highly in question, you could also say it was a gateway metal band, for after that i got into slayer, sepultura, pantera…
And really, i think ideas of them ever making an album as good as their first three are a little far fetched. Can anyone make an album as good anymore?
September 13th, 2008 at 8:48 am
@Svalka: It’s bad business for a bass player to badmouth his lead singer, so you have to expect him to say stuff like that, but I have to agree with you.
@bandaloon: I wouldn’t download anything from them considering that they are have a bank of lawyers on their team. Plus, what isn’t better than St. Anger?
@JR: Thanks. It seems like a longer version of what you said on your blog…
@Mat: I can understand what you’re saying. Everyone has their gateway albums, and everyone has a different degree of heaviness that they like in their metal. There’s nothing wrong with that. Metallica’s absolute disdain for metal for the subculture that spawned them is what makes them so bad.
As for making good albums late in their careers, look at Slayer. God Hates us all and Christ Illusion are (IMHO) as strong as their earlier material, and I find that I reach for them more often than even Seasons…. Getting old doesn’t mean that you have to give up…
September 13th, 2008 at 1:12 pm
Very well written. I can empathize with your feelings on many levels. A dude at my work the other day was all pumped because he said they were going to play the entire new Metallica album on the radio later. When he said that, I thought to myself, “Bro, Metallica hasn’t been relevant for years.” I remember first being exposed to the band with Kill “Em All and then loving their next two subsequent albums. I remember how sought after and rare the Garage Days EP was. I even have to admit I dug …And Justice For All and the Black Album, but hey, that was back in my adolescence. Since then however, Metallica in my opinion has basically become a non-entity. It was very interesting to learn how involved they were with whole copyright infringement fight; I had no idea of the extent to which they (lars) went to make a total ass of themselves.
September 14th, 2008 at 11:30 pm
@Mat
I live in Dallas, Texas and there is a radio station here (97.1 the eagle) that completely adores metallica. They have two-time tuesday and thursdays where they play back to back metallica and a whole hour devoted to the band on fridays. when their new song came out, they played it every 97 minutes… not to mention how many times it just happens to fall into the normal radio playlist…. which means it’s played A LOT.
September 15th, 2008 at 2:55 am
@Jon yes they definately strayed from the light there’s no arguing that. Even a stalwart fan as myself couldn’t swallow the pill that was st. anger, though they’ve still managed to produce some good songs.
I’ve also never realized how un-metal they were but i guess i’d never thought too hard on it either. They did sort-of become asshats.
I guess they’re like the transformers franchise to me. The original was amazing, but there were so many misfires and stinkers along the way that i’ve just held on and kept hoping for a bit of the past glory to come around..
I dunno, maybe all bands (and shows) need fans like me.
Slayer is still good because they haven’t changed a whole lot in sound as far as i can tell and they’ve stuck to whats good and do it well, though judging from Metallica’s new album, they haven’t quite given up just yet.
@Kasey
Most of the stations up here are classic or new rock, so tallica gets left behind a lot. Hopefully their new stuff will get some air time where i’m from (ontario)
yeah come to think of it a station up here used to have “metallica mondays” where they’d play a song every hour, though they did stop them eventually. 97.1 have a live feed?
September 15th, 2008 at 4:11 am
Awesome post Jon. Your arguments and analogies are very convincing and I totally see where you’re coming from with regard to your history as a metal fan.
I’m a far more pedestrian fan of metal, though, so I willingly gave the album a go – downloaded, of course – and was pleasantly surprised by it. Initially surprised that it didn’t suck, then surprised that the songs are coherent and somewhat original.
September 15th, 2008 at 7:49 am
F Metallica! Their drummer is a total douche! Lars – PFFFTTT! I did see them on the Black Album tour back in college and enjoyed it. It may have been the weed but, it was a good show. Thankfully back then the new stuff didn’t get played as much and they played mostly their earlier stuff.
I will stick with Iron Maiden.
September 15th, 2008 at 11:54 am
Jon, You don’t like the song “Enter Sandman”?…I don’t know a lot about the band…though listening to Lars whine is annoying. I thought it was a pretty good metal tune.
September 16th, 2008 at 4:25 am
Andrew, i think Metallica killed Jon’s dog
or at least the musical equivalent.
September 18th, 2008 at 4:08 am
well… I’ve also had some issues with _____allica over the years, but ‘Death Magnetic’ is good!
it kind of goes back to their thrashier days with a slight mix of Load…
but you’re free to have your own attitude towards them
just my two cents
September 20th, 2008 at 4:55 am
I have to say, that WAS brilliant! I grew up listening to MetallicA in my junior high school to high school days. I’m only 24 now. I learned to play guitar, and for most people learning guitar, I was obsessed with them. They did revolutionize metal and also have disgraced it to many people. I doubt I’ll buy Death Magnetic because I rarely buy CD’s in the first place, but I do like how they are ‘attempting’ to bring back something that they lost in the past. No, Death Magnetic isn’t the new Kill Em All or Ride The Lightning, but it is a step on them trying to redeem themselves, at least musically. Now, take out the legal battles over ridiculous things such as a make up product or perfume, and they may someday gain something back before they’re too old to physically play anymore. There’s nowhere to go but down for them being at the top like they were, let’s hope the fall after St. Anger and the Napster backlash, plus all the other things they’ve done will help straighten them out. I’d eventually like to see them in concert, but not as long as they continue the path they’ve been traipsing. – Palsh
September 23rd, 2008 at 5:39 am
I wholeheartedly agree with everything said here, as its almost word for word what ive been saying about selloutallica for years. Even down to the haircuts bit. Theyre a sad imitation of what they once were, and seeing Lars wheeze his way through a performance of some crock of shit from DM on the Jools Holland show on Saturday, was just embarrassing. He was always a shit drummer & a complete asshole, now hes somehow managed to become an even BIGGER asshole and an even WORSE drummer.
RIP Metallica, that band died with Cliff Burton (tho i do love ..AJFA)
October 1st, 2008 at 5:05 pm
I agree with you but I want to add a few things.
1. I think metallica had lost their “creativity” with the death of Cliff Burton. first album “kill em’ all” was nice but it was not that great musically. basically it was a dave mustaine album, fast riffs and solos; it was all about speed. after cliff started to write down songs begining with “ride the lightning” and followed by ” master of puppets”, metallica had peaked musically. james, dave, lars were only interested in nwobhm or stuff like that. on the other hand mr. burton was listenin lynyrd skynyrd, j.s.bach. reading h.p lovecraft. he was a brilliant guy with an open mind, even can be called an intellectual. maybe he wasnt writing all of the songs on his own but it was obvious that he had a huge influence on the band. after he died (and of course mustaine was kicked out before that), it was now up to lars and james to “compose” the songs. the new bass player jason newsted had also some talent but these two assholes didnt give him the oppurtunity to show himself. in ajfa they used what was left from cliff and his legacy, probably “to live is to die” is the best piece of music from that album.
unlike most of the fans i found black album quite succesful when its compared to newer stuff that metallica have crapped out. every new album was worse than the older one. album by album lars and james spend their “good” material, so for every new album there was less “good” material.
when they did the thing with symphony i was a little excited, however they failed me again. i was expecting to hear “orion, fade to black, to live is to die, the four horsemen,..” they choose to play the crap from load/reload. a concert without “creeping death”? fuck it man.
jason left the band because of the known issues there is no need to mention them again and they replaced him with an ape or gorilla; whatever you want to call him. when i saw this moron acting like a monkey on the stage where cliff used to play i felt sad, sad for these clowns.
“st.anger” was the lowest point they could have ever get. an album without guitar solos? maybe you have noticed that i havent written anything about kirk hammet yet. its because he is one of the biggest pussies you can ever see in a metal band. if i’m the lead guitarist of a band and the other members of the band told me that in the new album there wont be any guitar solos, i fucking quit the band at that moment. 25 years in metallica and “enter sandman” is the only remarkable thing that has he done?
you know sometimes i wish cliff had never won that card game, things would be so much different.
anyway, after “st.anger” i lost all my hopes about this band, and i know that the only difference between the new album:”death magnetic” and “st.anger” would be the long and boring guitar solos. and i think i have made a good estimation.
imho james and lars have really small amounts of musical talent. james used to be a good lyric writer in 80s but now he also sucks in it too. he tries to sing like a country singer (god knows why) and ruins all the good songs they made in past. kirk doesnt give anything new besides wah-wah, and “the planet of the apes” whirls round and doesnt get dizzy.
2. After cliff, the band musically died but still they got the metal spirit for a while. You can watch an old clip from “kill em all” days where they were promoting the album in a gig and james says “kill all the fucking posers out there, kill all the fake people”(or something similar to that). he was referring to glam metal bands lik mötley crüe, guys wearing fancy clothes and having make up like ladies and perform like that. this was the “metallica”, the band wrote songs like “ride the lightning”, “for whom the bell tolls”, “disposable heroes”, “one”, and justice for all”,… the protest, the uprising against the system, one of the key elements of metal music.
however with the “black album” things have changed 180 degrees. “one” had turned into “dont tread on me”. only in 2 years. what the fuck happened? i can tell you what happened, the mainstream doesnt accept protest or “anti” anything. you have to move with the trend. it is like that all over world and i guess usa is not an exception. metallica wanted to be famous, basically lars did. and they “sold their souls”. they saw the lights of hollywood in their first grammy awards, and they liked it. they could have toured with slayer, antrax,… but they would have missed the hall of fame if they chose that path. so first they toured with gnr than it continued until they tour with kidrock and linkin park. they become mtv idol and let snoopdog, avril lavigne or other shitty so called “musicians” to play their “beloved” songs. they hurt us, they hurt us bad.
they cut their hair, get private jets piercings therapists sunglasses fancy clothes etc.
james used to say “kill all the posers”, but man who are the posers now?
3. one last word to the people who seems to like new metallica albums. when you hear “battery” in a bar you dont say “oh man they are playing metallica” you say “they are playing battery dude”. but if the song is “bleeding me” you say “oh its metallica playin”. you dont say the name of the song probably you dont even recognize the name. people go and buy load, reload, st.anger, death magnetic not because they are good, but because they are metallica albums. think that “death magnetic” was released by a band called “group 84″ who would listen this crap? and after 6 months would you still be listening this album?
PS. sorry for the possible grammer and spelling mistakes
October 6th, 2008 at 1:09 pm
On the point about working with orchestras, Dream Theater did a 20th anniversary show called “Score”, second half of the show was done with an orchestra. To say the least, it was amazing. But DT is a crew of TRUE musicians, dedicated to the fans that made them who they are today!!
October 16th, 2008 at 8:34 am
The new album is actually pretty good. 7/8 out of ten is what the Chronicles of Chaos reviewers gave it, and I’d probably place it somewhere around 7 myself. There are definitely plenty of solid modern thrash songs – the first five and the last four sure – and it’s unmistakably Metallica.
January 8th, 2010 at 2:03 am
There’s a radio station in chicago that plays a mix of old and new metallica and quite a bit off of death magnetic. I gotta say that it isn’t as good as it should have been. It’s overproduced and with all the starts and stops and gratuitous bonus riffs thrown in that don’t fit in, the flow of the song gets ruined. It sound like they are trying too hard instead of letting the heavy come natural. Don’t get me wrong, I like gratutitous riffing but the song shouldn’t sound like a chopped up mishmash. World painted blood much better, imho.
February 25th, 2010 at 9:26 pm
I respect your opinion. I love Metallica & my favoraite album was The Black Album. As far as the first four albums I thought they sounded like absolute garbage. I am also getting so sick of the sell out phrase being used way to much. Just because they have one of the biggest selling albums of all time does not make them a sell out. By the way, I support Lars (one of the greatest drummers of all time) on the whole Napster thing. If it was your songs & you were losing money I bet you would be crying like a little bitch at K-Mart.
Metallica rules
March 13th, 2010 at 3:09 am
holy crap! I could not have said that better!
and damn it -I could not agree more…
Curt King
Demolish HQ