How long has it been since there was even a glimmer of hope to be had that the former masters of metal, one of the vaunted big four, would release not a great album, but even just a good album? How long has it been since metal fans of a certain age could relish the latest Metallica release? Almost twenty years? Yea, that's a long, long time for the once great metal outfit to languish in a purgatory of mediocrity and irrelevance. I would have never guessed I would be writing these words when I caught them as a young man on the Damaged Justice tour with Queensryche oh so many years ago, but as my teens passed me by, so did the quality output that we were used to getting from Metallica.
The sad truth is, my favorite Metallica albums were all put out before the nineties began, and I have little use for anything that came after the Black album. It pained me to see one of my favorite bands go from trailblazer to sheep following the herd, but it was something I dealt with long ago, and put aside. What else could I do? I found it pathetic to watch Metallica and its members flounder with ridiculous stances on issues that had made them initially, and even worse, releasing music that would have embarrassed a "me too" hard rock outfit. It seemed as if they would never get it together.
But I always hoped. To such end, it was with great interest that I followed the hype around St. Anger, and the rumors of a much awaited return to form, only for my hopes to be once again dashed upon the rocks of disappointment by what can only be seen as a bad, bad mistake. There was nothing about St. Anger that even hinted at the promised return to form, only a misguided attempt to gain some sort of relevance by gravy training on to what they thought would be popular. Once again, Metallica was very wrong.
Tags: metallica, death magnetic, review, reviews, music, metal, thrash, speed, heavy, cd, vinyl, audio, rock, hard
