Metallica - Death Magnetic

Phew! It's been a long time, eh? Without further ado, I'm going to go straight on to the review:

Metallica's ninth studio album, Death Magnetic.

Oright, here's the deal: Death Magnetic (henceforth shall be known as DM) to the tremendously disappointing, nay, downright abomination that is St. Anger. While everyone knows that Load and Reload were basically James Hetfield's foray into blues and country wrapped in a masquerading as Hard Rock, but St.Anger was so way off the mark I thought this was it; the end of it all. The production was really horrible; it was as though Lars Ulrich was really hitting upside down metal trash cans while the guitars were so chuggy that upping the bass on the equaliser would have made my table shake violently. James's singing was truly bad; hoarse and oftentimes completely out of tune. And the less mention of the non-existent solos the better.

Simply put, St.Anger was a career-ending move. All hope was gone.

And now we come to this, last year's "comeback" album. Of course, it's not fair to say that this is a comeback album ala Take That or Gayzone, whoops, Boyzone, because the boys didn't go anywhere. Instead, they embarked on tour after tour, with the newest addition to the band, bassist Robert "Look, Ma! I'm a spider!" Trujillo.

The key thing here is patience. A whole 70 minutes worth of it. The songs are long, some a tad bit too long for its own good, like Cyanide and the meandering instrumental, Suicide & Redemption (I know it ain't no The Call of Ktulu II, but at least do something a bit more interesting instead of playing the same 3 riffs ad nauseam). Also, the production needs to be addressed. I have an okay/not okay relationship with it. On some days, I actually kind of like it. Sometimes the horrible clipping and the loudness (it is friggin' loud) reminds me of fingernails scratching a black board.

Surprisingly, Lars delivers--by his standards--a solid performance. I'm no drummer, but what's with the abandonment of the ride cymbal? Tsk, tsk. And there's double bass! Whoop-dee-doo!

Overall, I have to admit to this: I like the album. A lot. I thought I was going to hate it but the Metallica boys have managed to exceed all my expectations. Of course, there are some things I wish they would improve on; chiefly, the length of the songs. I'd much rather have short songs that are high on energy than have songs that are 6 to 7 minutes long that tend to meander at the middle. Hetfield needs to ditch the country tendencies as well. This ain't no steak-and-grill-kinda band!

Now where did I put that I CD?

Initial Rating: 7/10

Current Rating: 8.5/10