After St. Anger, a lot of people lost faith in Metallica.
We all know what happened, we all got very annoyed at the way they blamed us for their less than adequate album selling precisely -1 copy (I stole it from the shop and then returned it) and this has really damaged the reputation of Metallica, and still people feel very bitter about it, and so it’s very hard not to have this at the back of my mind while listening to this album. They need to do a lot to make people forgive them.
One thing that helped my forgive them was seeing them live on their Master of Puppet’s 20th Anniversary tour where they were amazing, simply one of the best live performances I’ve ever seen. This was a help to me to listen to this with a completely open mind.
Fist off, this album is not going to be a classic, although, after half a dozen listens, I am enjoying it more each time.
I’ve seen a lot of poor reviews claiming the death of Metallica and saying that this album is poor, but I think that it’s hard for a band with such legacy to bring out an album that ends up being critically acclaimed, somebody name me one band where people say that their 20th album is their best.
So lets take it from the start.
We start with a slow intro into That Was Just Your Life, the guitar plucking your ear hairs as you wait expectedly to hear what’s in store. Blaw Blaw, some nice heavy riffage comes in and drum, blam, drum, blam and we’re off with a nice fast number that reaks of olden day Metallical. I find myself nodding and tapping.
We continue on through some nice tempos and rhythms, breaks and some nice singing from James Hetfield.
At times the songs sound very similar to other Tallica songs of old, but these similarities are at the edge of hearing that twang some memory. Like when you see something that reminds you of the dream you had last night and you go ‘hmmm, oh well.’
The album is mainly heavy with a few flecks of soft music in there, with only one purely soft song ‘The Unforgiven III’. I’d say they succeeded in capturing the style of old; sometimes bands say that their next album is going to back to the style of their old material and when you listen to the album, there’s nothing about it that resembles their original material. I refer you to Korn’s more recent albums.
This album will be hated by many Metallica purists, but no matter what they did, those people would hate this album no matter what it sounded like, but with an open mind, and having forgotten all about St. Anger (what album?) I find this a very wholesome and rewarding album that on it’s own merit, is very servicable.
Listen to this album: While riding a horse, wearing armour.
78%
Extracts from ‘It was just your life’, ‘All nightmare long’, ‘The Unforgiven’ and ‘My Apocolypse’
The Day That Never Comes from Death Magnetic
