Metallica

Detective Beauregard said:

I don't think it's supposed to sound good; it's hilarious overplaying at its finest. That intro drum fill... :lol:

Edit: The post-solo bridge is hysterical, too.
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Yep, that is the one. TBH, I think Portnoy's take wouldn't differ much from this one.
MrKnickerbocker said:
The double bass in the chorus is so bad. I love it.
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Same here.

And just to satisfy list-makers...

Two thumbs up:
RTL
MOP
AJFA
DM

Thumb up:
KEA
Black album

I don't think so:
Load
Reload
Hardwired

Never again:
St. Anger
Lulu
 
St. Anger (the song, not the album) isn‘t good?
All their album have some merits IMO, DM has good stuff on it, but I prefer Harwired. As someone said, they sound fire on that album, and the arrangements are awesome as well.
 
Flaming Blimp Crash said:
Hardwired is the album that Death Magnetic should have been. Death Magnetic I feel they were trying to overcompensate and make the songs more complicated and convoluted than they needed to be. Killer riffs on DM, but they really should've took a less is more approach on it. That Was Just Your Life, The Day That Never Comes and All Nightmare Long are perfect as is though.
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I'm kinda the opposite, ever since (and including) the Black album, Metallica have simplified their songs. Probably the influence of Bob Rock.
In my opinion, Bob Rock killed Metallica. (Well, the type of Metallica that I liked).
I can't be bothered with this simplified stuff, I preferred the more complicated and intricate stuff.
Although, in saying that AJFA was trying too much, it just drones on and on and on, kinda complex but very repetitive for way too long.

Death Magnetic was shat on, and thrown at their fans. The clipping is just atrocious. The songs themselves are OKish, but nothing I have any desire to listen to anymore. I think Hardwired is a cross between the black album and load. I think it would appeal to people who love TBA as it is accessible and very polished. That's fine, to each their own, just not my taste.
 
Shite - Lulu
Have a few ok moments - Black, St. Anger
Good - Reload
Very good - Load, Hardwired
Great - Kill'em All, Master of Puppets, Death Magnetic
Superb - Ride The Lightning

...and the absolute number 1
 
KidInTheDark666 said:
I might as well post mine, although I know what the reactions will be.

1. Death Magnetic
2. Black Album
3. Reload
4. AJFA
5. Ride the Lightning
6. Hardwired
7. Load
8. St. Anger
9. Master of Puppets
10. Kill 'Em All
11. Beyond Magnetic
12. Garage inc.
massive gap
13. Lulu
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2020 update:

1...And Justice For All
2. Death Magnetic
3. Reload
4. Black Album
5. Ride the Lightning
6. Hardwired
7. St. Anger
8. Master of Puppets
9. Kill Em All
10. Load

But honestly, the gaps between these albums are extremely tight. I have rated AJFA 92% and Load 81%.
 
MindlessPieces said:
I think Hardwired is a cross between the black album and load. I think it would appeal to people who love TBA as it is accessible and very polished. That's fine, to each their own, just not my taste.
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While I'm not the biggest TBA lover around (it's very good, but not the most interesting album to listen thoroughly, in my opinion anyway), I can see where you're coming from!

Hardwired sort of combines the more accessible and melodic approach of the band's self-titled black album with slightly more adventurous & genre hybrid-y hit/miss nature of the Load(s), resulting in very enjoyable and energetic, relatively versatile and adventurous, but also a bit too bloated record.

What I love about Hardwired is that it combines those mentioned 90's Metallica aspects with more aggressive edge (of course, very different kind of energy from the 80's angry_young_men vibes, but it's there) and more alive yet (attempted - at least!) polished sound. In a way, as I've often noted, it shares this kind of qualities with The Book of Souls album by Maiden. How well these... attempted qualities come across and succeed is debatable though.

What I do not love about it... well, it's bit of a mish-mash indeed and slightly too jarring. While, say, Load was more consistent album of similar nature, Hardwired sounds more alive, which gives it some edge in it's "vibe" - even if not in the production quality itself. Hard as it is to properly describe, for me anyway, that's what makes Hardwired very interesting record and somewhat easier to listen to than many others, even if it's quite a mouthful for a single listening session anyway.

Also, Halo on Fire has become a huge song for me. One of my favourite vocal performances by James, probably.
 
Some stuff on DM is great, like Judas Kiss, some of it is too commercial, like the beginning of Unforgiven 3 (I prefer #2).
Hardwired is more elaborated, has more finesse and is also heavier imo, and I thought they were really still showing everybody who the kings are on it (even tho I prefer Maiden, because they’re better live).
 
The Black Album was my introduction to Metallica and metal in general. Grunge and alternative rock had taken over the charts while I first heard it. It was like a revelation for me and maybe that's why I rate it among their 3 best.
 
MindlessPieces said:
In my opinion, Bob Rock killed Metallica. (Well, the type of Metallica that I liked).
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I think it was the other way around. Metallica chose Bob Rock because they wanted to make simplified songs.

For example, I think it was in "Some Kind of Monster" or somewhere when James talked about he started seeing voice coach during Black album era. IIRC correctly, voice coach wanted to do note scales on piano and James went "Uhn-un. I'm not doing that." Afterward the voice coach showed him his Grammys or awards or whatever and then James went "OK. I get it now."
To me, this is just one example where they, alone, chose the road they wanted to go then choose "the tools" that made them who they were back then.
 
MindRuler said:
The Black Album was my introduction to Metallica and metal in general. Grunge and alternative rock had taken over the charts while I first heard it. It was like a revelation for me and maybe that's why I rate it among their 3 best.
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I too was not interested in the '90s music scene at all, and I think the first time Metallica caught my attention was a video for either Fuel or Memory Remains (my memory is fuzzy). So my introduction to them was actually Reload, back around '97. Being only like 14, I couldn't really appreciate the whole album and so the singles stood out, but I loved them. So I worked my way backwards and when I hit the black album I was floored by the power of the songs - the overall tightness of not just the riffs, but of the whole band. I was drawn more toward the heavy, mid-tempo stuff like Sad But True, Wherever I May Roam, and even deeper cuts like Of Wolf and Man and God That Failed. The Unforgiven hit me hard, too. I couldn't really get into the faster tracks, though. What I noticed most was how much simpler the songs were than those on Load and Reload - it was just riffs (multi-tracked), solos, bass, and drums. The Loads were more layered because Kirk played rhythm that often differed from James's parts, and that worked - but the power couldn't compare.

I'm pretty sure I heard Puppets after that and discovered that their faster songs were so much better in the '80s - and I have never been a fan of thrash! I still don't care for their ultra-thrashy stuff (usually album openers like Fight Fire With Fire, closers like Damage Inc. and Dyers Eve, and most of Kill 'Em All), but Puppets was nearly perfect. I remember really liking Justice, too, but it didn't become my favorite Metallica album until years later when I got into prog stuff like Dream Theater and could really appreciate the sheer magnitude of some of those songs (by Metallica standards, of course). Harvester of Sorrow - which, ironically, is probably the simplest song from Justice - was my favorite Metallica song for a long time.

To be honest, I like the majority of what Metallica has done. Sure, St. Anger was rough, but it actually had some weirdly catchy moments. The Loads were loaded (ugh) with filler, but had the band trimmed the fat to about 15 songs, the album(s) would have been killer. Death Magnetic was solid if a bit contrived, and I actually preferred the roughly-mixed Beyond Magnetic EP to the album proper. Hardwired was a decent return to form and easily on par with the Loads, but it still had a second disk that was mostly filler. Regardless, it had Metallica's best song in decades in Spit Out the Bone, which was like their classic thrashy songs except with melody.
 
8. St. Anger - By far one of my least favorite albums ever. Definitely the worst Metallica album. There's nothing redeemable about it, this album was an attempt to cash in on the nu-metal craze of the time it was recorded. Terrible, just terrible.

7. Reload - Aside from one song, Fuel, this album is really bad. However the one song that is good is really good, and alone better than the previous album I rated in it's entirety, so there's that.

6. Load - This album has a couple okay tunes, but they're hard rock, they're not thrash or even metal at all. The rest is pure garbage.

5. The Black Album - It's not a thrash metal album, but the production is really nice and there's some good songs on here. Wherever I May Roam? That song is killer! The Unforgiven is great as well. Sure it's not the Metallica we all know and love, but it's still good music, and that's the most important thing.

4. And Justice For All - Very overrated album, but it's still great. Dyer's Eve is the best song on the album by far. This is a thrash album, it's fast and it kicks ass. There is some filler on here though, Eye of the Beholder, The Shortest Straw, and the Frayed Ends of Sanity are complete garbage in my book.

3. Master of Puppets - A revered album, and for good reason. From start to finish this is a great album. Not a bad song on it.

2. Kill 'Em All - Amazing album. Every song is great, the production quality kind of sucks, but when the songs are this good, that doesn't matter.

1. Ride The Lightning - This is Metallica, this is thrash metal. Every song on here rocks, even the lesser played ones like Escape and Trapped Under Ice.
 
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