Metal Reviews

On St Anger wait a minute let me go count for myself hmmm um well there is nah that song sucks well there's the title tra nah that sucks too um maybe nah that one sucks too hmmm this one is tough oh wait yeah yeah I found a good song One oh wait that's from AJFA.

Ok there's For Whom the Bell Tolls oh wait that's from Ride The Lightning.I'll get this just wait oh how about Battery oh wait that's from Master Of Puppets.Well gosh darnit you did say St Anger right? um um well son of a gun and a house cat wearing underwear I can't find any good songs on St Anger but we have some nice parting gifts for you and thanks for playing come back again.

Anyone with a positive thing to say about SA hasn't heard it recently and are trying to convince themselves that it wasn't that bad.

I think most of you are prejudiced by the production. I was myself too - but not with St. Anger, but with AJFA which HAS a very bad production and at the beginning it was my least favourite Metallica Album (this was before the Loads).

Yeah, St. Anger has bad tracks like Shoot me again or Invisible Kid, but the Unnamed Feeling is good, My World, Frantic, Some Kind of Monster, All Within my Hands...

and I think the production is also the reason why many say that DM is not so good.

But trust me: it is good! VERY good! The best Metallica Album since the 80s.

So, 'One', 'For Whom The Bell Tolls' & 'Battery' are just "good" songs then right? Because thats what we're talking about here. Not great, just good songs. Why would you bring those songs up in this discussion?

Oops huh?

Look, there's nothing brilliant on St. Anger. Its Metallica's worst album.

Difference is, I don't take it personally and don't conform to the notion that there's nothing of value there. I didn't rush judgement on a first impression and some of the tracks grew on me. While some of them I still think are shit. But then again, I think some of the tracks on their classic albums are shit too.

Here my threatened track by track review.

That was just your life - begins slowly and builds up to a great typical thrash riff in the veins of blackened or Jump in the Fire. Has a great fast solo part at the end. 9,5 /10

The End of the line - Begins like the "new song" but it isn't. After the short introriff comes a cool thrash riff which leads to the strophe which is one of the best of the whole album and it's just fun to listen to it. Reminds me to No Remorse mixed with Fuel. 9,5/10

Broken Beat and Scarred - Not as fast as the first two, but with a good groove. In the end it gets faster and even better. Cool song. 9/10

The Day that never comes - Begin reminds me of Fade to Black and One, the second half is just great with one of the best solo of the whole album. One little letdown is, that the second part is not as detailed as the second part of One or FTB. There could be more soli. 8,5/10

All Nightmare Long - Begins slowly, but gets very fast with a very catchy chorus. The second part with the instrumentals is awesome! This is sparta...äh thrash metal! 9/10

Cyanide - Not the best, but my favourite Track. It's not so fast as the first 2, but has a gigantic Chorus. The Solo Part could be a bit better, but the chorus is just as good as e.g. Enter Sandman. Could be on the black album. 8,5/10

The Unforgiven III - The most loadish song with the same mishmash guitar sound, but not that bad. First I didn't like it, but with the time, it grew bigger. BUT, as good as it is, it doesn't really fit to the very heavy rest. It's like the new A Tout le Monde version of Megadeths United Abomination. It's good and solid but doesn't fit. 7,5 / 10

The Judas Kiss - This is the "bow down song", the chorus we all know from the mission metallica clips. The buildup is very groovy, but the transition to the chorus is not soooo good. But the chorus itself is better. Solid Track. 8/10

Suicide & Redemption - Slow buildup. Goes into a very good ballad like part at 3:40 which grows and gets harder and faster with the time and has it's climax at 6:40 to 7:20 where one of the coolest and best parts of the album begins, which is a real BIGTIME goose bump moment. This instrumental is nearly 10 minutes long, but feels more like 5 or 6. It's IMO one of the best instrumentals from Metallica and General - and I do say that, even though I'm not a big instrumental fan. 9,5 / 10

My Apocalypse - the fastest track of the album, and the fastest track from Metallica since Dyers Eve and very hard, nearly slayer like at some parts. Has a very very good solo part, with a little excerpt of another solo at 2:39/2:40 of an old Metallica Song, but I don't know where it is from. That Metallica came with such a hard and fast song is nearly a wonder and it's just pure sonic power. Pure fucking Thrash Speed Metal. 10 / 10

Makes a average rating of 9,5 + 9,5 + 9 + 8,5 + 9 + 8,5 + 7,5 + 8 + 9,5 + 10 = 89/100

And THAT'S why this album is that damn good!

Your opinions might be uncritizable, (they're your opinions, after all) but the scores you assigned to each separate track are bullshit.

I'm listening this album since September 12th nearly every day and I think I can judge it fair enough. And I'm not alone with my opinion - maybe here, but I think here is everything bad what came after 1990 anyway. Just read this review: http://www.craveonline.com/articles/mus ... netic.html or this http://wcbstv.com/topstories/metallica. ... 19315.html

Picked this up today, as I remembered I rather liked All Nightmare Long. More detailed comments soon...

Do you know what sarcasm is seeing that my sarcasm escaped you for some reason.

Frigid is right. You scored some of those songs way too high but nonetheless it is an opinion. Just get over the fact that many disagree with you.

So there are good songs on St. Anger.

I'm glad we agree. We're going to get along swimmingly, I can tell.

I've been saying this too.

I was not at all surprised to hear the demo version of this song contained a different chorus because it just doesn't fit. (Except for the last time they go to it, that time it works much better)

The chorus part itself is fantastic and the rest of the song it cool too, but the transition between the two just doesn't work IMO. Its my biggest gripe on the whole album. (This and the other cut & paste job on End Of The Line) The parts themselves I like & can completely understand why they'd want to include them, but I'm not happy with they way they are.

I'd love to hear the song the 'bow down' part was originally lifted from.

What I can't understand is, that many are criticizing when riffs are repeated, beacause, normally, in nearly every song of any other band on this planet, riffs are repeating, because it's the main character of a song, with a structure, that the riffs and parts are reped. Verse, Chorus, Verse, Chorus, Instrumental, Verse, Chorus or only Chorus. That's what a song is all about. It's nothing special.

I think that the bow down chorus would fit better to "The End of the Line". Maybe in this way:

Yes, but while any decent thrash band repeats their riffs eight times or something per verse or chorus, Metallica (like Opeth, lol) repeat theirs, what, twenty-four times or more. Ad nauseam.

If a riff is cool, I can't have enough. Even songs like Seek and Destroy or Master of Puppets or Ride the Lightning have the main riffs very often.

I have to admit, bands like Dream Theater, Children of Bodom, ect. have ruined me on the repeated use of a riff so I really get tired of the same riff throughout the song all the time, which was very common 20 years ago, but now, that approach isn't as good and none of the great bands are repetitive. The best idea is to play variations on the same notes if you wanna maintain a songs feel for more than six minutes.

True; but it just happens that they actually are better than Slayer.

Indeed. Without a shadow of a doubt.

Yes riffs are usually repeated but the main difference with Metallica on this album is that where it's usually repeated on 4-5 minute song, here it's repeated on 9 minute tracks. Take a guess at which will tire you more... Also the riffs on some of the songs seem tacked on one after the other, with little to no variance, which makes them flow ackwardly, which makes some of them stick out like a sore thumb and when that happens the repetitions are a lot more obvious than on a perfect flowing song buildup.

I wish you wouldn't make me disect this album as much, because the more I dig the more critical I become and now I'm almost at the point where I feel I should be shaving 5 points off my rating and be in perfect accord with Zad.