Metallica's Death Magnetic - September, 2008 = 89%

First off, anything would be an improvement over Metallica's last album, the horrid St. Anger and this album is most definitely of a higher league. The four peeps are doing things right again.

- - What's Going On Good
The shining excellence here are the solo's by Kirk Hammett. Robert Trujillo plays very well on bass and remains in the pocket nicely on all the tracks except for one. Not to worry he steps out of the pocket in front just on one song it comes across very well. Trujillo and Hammet clearly carry this album. Hetfields vocals are not quite what they once were but he does well enough carrying the tunes. He does however sing in a higher octave at a few points than what we have heard before just for good measure. Lyrically it is all Hetfield as usual, singing about his usual subject matter...death, the end of the world, and being emotionally scarred.

However Death Magnetic is much more instrumental than it is vocal. Several tracks are well over a minute into the song before you'll hear anything from Hetfield's vocals. The rhythm and guitar play is very complex with fast chord changes on this release. Guitar Hero will have a hand in this album. In fact, on a few occasions you will feel as though your playing Guitar Hero just by listening to this album. The speed and complexity on many of these songs is impressive at times. Metallica and Rick Rubin are looking to create an epic style album in this one and they take a good hard stab at it. Is it actually an epic release?... well ...no. However, it is a credible release and deserves to be well on the higher end of the list as far as Metal releases in the past couple years go. The only real clunker is the very last song "My Apocolypse". This song is quite close to something off of St. Anger and sounds as nothing more than a cleaned up left-over from that album. On most songs there's a more mature sounding Metallica than on their previous album (thankfully). The album purposefully runs more as a musical piece than simply a collection of tunes. The 10 tracks give the perception of a continuous head to tail affair just like a snake and yes, there's even an instrumental lump in the middle..

- - The Production/Recording
The album sounds like Queensryche meets Metallica's Black Album. Rick Rubin adding his own fancy fairy dust to the production completes Death Magnetic's productional equation. It is definitely not a stripped down sound or a garage style production like St. Anger. It is a  clean, "stylistic" sound. My ears are convinced this album was recorded digitally to hard disc with a few guitar parts mixed down back to disc through an analogue mixing console to fatten those particular strings up a bit up. At least one guitar always seems be left with a cleaner, digital sound. The production aspect that you'll consistently hear all through Death Magnetic and it's parts is one heavy sounding guitar, one clean guitar, gated drums, and some time-based effects on the guitar solo's. At times, what is known as "doubling" is exercised. This technique uses two or more separate tracks, playing the same exact musical part, in order to add character and flavor to the instrument or vocal. While it never reaches the level of being over-produced there is a bit of gloss here.

The production value to Lar's kit is a gated and compressed (as usual) sound but don't worry ... the drums are a mile better sounding than on their previous effort, even if style is lacking a bit here. The drums may seem to lack a little in style but what saves them is a definite urgency to their sound on this album. For right now Mr. Ulrich grades are indeed suffering but the compression and gating created enough urgency extra credit points to pass the class. The drums "seem" loud and high in the mix but it isn't because they are turned up much more than usual. The reason the drums sound as such is because the compression (compression in the actual recording of the drums ..not file compression...) and gating effect can give the impression that the instruments are mixed at a higher volume than others in the song but they actually aren't. They just planted in the mix and sitting in your face more, which is more-over the case on this album. What is best here is Metallica has that "serious" sound to their music (which was completely abandoned in St. Anger's production) on all but a just a few songs. 

- - Issues?
Lars Ulrich. Lars Ulrich continues to add to the argument that he is not that great of a drummer anymore. It is clearly showing on their last album and as well on this one. Faster does not mean better. He does well on a few songs, adding a bit of swing to his style (which he desperately needs) but most of the time his play is almost dull. Another issue on this album is it may be a bit too busy at times. The songs change direction and tempo a bit too much which can leave the listener slightly put-off or unfocused. On the thrash tracks you get an increase in speed but a decrease in quality.

*I've said it before and I'll say it again after hearing their new album (and you will too) ....the slower Metallica plays ....the better Mettalica plays these days. Metallica doing harder thrash simply degrades their quality anymore. On the thrash style numbers Hetfield sounds unnatural and his band mates bring about a "forced" sound. The sound when the tempo reaches this level doesn't grab you as they could in the past. In addition, the faster songs show a drop in song writing skills compared to this albums slower numbers. The world is forever changing and naturally Metallica has also changed from what they were 20 years back.

What could of been different is that instead of following a good groove when they discover it, Metallica completely changes rhythm, tempo, and direction sometimes four and five times in a single track and it considerably lessens what could of been a few potentially better songs on this album. While this has usually been a staple of the Metallica song writing trademark in the past, on this album it can get in the way. Most of the time the complexity is impressive but at times I do find myself loosing focus on some of the songs instead of getting into them further. Metallica doesn't reach full circle or 100% but the good clearly outweighs the not so good this time. Death Magnetic brings back a seriousness which shows the the band putting a lot of work and sweat into the songs.

- - Song Notes
"That Was Just Your Life" - Good Track. Nothing earth shattering but it is solid.
"The End Of The Line"- Can you say "The Immigrant Song"? Over-all it is a good track.
“Broken, Beat & Scarred”- Very Good (brought down just a tad by being too fast and a bit too busy).
"My Apocalapyse" - Poor song. Too poor to include on an album. Just cleaner St. Anger material.
*All Nightmare Long"- Love the title. Good track.
*"The Day That Never Comes"- Hurray. Possibly the best track on the album. Very good song that is approaching epic quality, even if it is a bit dragged out.
*"The Judas Kiss"- A high quality track. A strong Metallica.
*That Was Just Your Life- Good Track
"Cyanide"- Semi-decent, but surely nothing remarkable. Again this one gets too busy with changes.
*"The Unforgiven III" - Quite good. Again, slower is better for today's Metallica.

- - Death Magnetic In Summary
Realistically the album is not a masterpeice as they may of been shooting for by the sound of the album and how it is put together. However, Death Magnetic is certainly not any disappointment. What I hear is a good execution for it's intention and being more over a solid effort in what type of album it is. It has a few issues that keep it from reaching the cloud they were soaring for and a few songs may be just a minute too long, but still, Death Magentic deserves "just do" and a rating on the lower side of the high scale. If you are a Metallica's fan your sure to be satisfied this time out. If your not a hard core Metallica fan however your interested in Metallica's new album you'll appreciate the moderate change in production from Metallica's previous works and the complex instrumentation this album can bring. 

*At the end of the day all anyone can ask in scenarios such as Metallica's is for a Metal band, that's serious about their music, to work really hard in order to deliver stronger records. The cue is taken. 


"Rise. Fall Down. Rise again... What don't kill ya make ya more strong".  James Hetfield, 2008


My Rating is 89%


Ian Billen

Thanks for saving me the time listening to this Ian!

Loud droning at it's best no doubt though

Ian Billen wrote on Sep 9^th, 2008 at 4:29pm:


St. Anger was so badly compressed, you'd think they learned something.... Let me know when you get to do a real listen...
I'm listening to a very old Voivod album right now. Dimension Hatross. This is a band that I got into after Metallica got me listening to Thrash/Metal in the 80's... This album is still pretty rocking, even 20 years later.

gimmekeef wrote on Sep 9^th, 2008 at 10:34am:


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Mr. GimmeKeef, I certainly wouldn't expect you or anyone "not" to listen to a peice of music based on my, or anyones review. Give it a listen for yourself mate. Who knows, you may find it fairly different than what I or anyone has rated it as. Let us know what you think.


Ian

Holden wrote on Sep 10^th, 2008 at 9:31am:


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If it is done well, regardless of genre, I will appreciate it. I enjoyed The Black Album as yourself.  I also like Load and ReLoad. However I don't like EVERYTHING that comes along. For instance St. Anger was simply an atrocity. I can listen to A LOT as most here know but put on St. Anger and I look for the nearest exit like the place is on fire or crawl into a fetal position... whichever ends the agony first.   

The album was NOT Bob Rocks fault as many believe, well ..except for the drum sound... Still it is an amazing feat he managed to get even three songs from them (as god awful as the songs were) let alone an entire album ...even if it did take two years. Almost anybody would of gave up or moved on and left it, even though it was Metallica. If you watch Metallica's earlier documentary Rock was much more of a butt mover and didn't back down easily from the band. On the St. Anger sessions that approach would of ended things quite quickly. He knew that. This is why he was so unobtrusive during those sessions. It was the only gleam of hope in getting an album out of them.

By the way, have you heard their latest album? As I said in my review it is a good album and in my ears it is the very best they could do right now, as they are in 2008. Sure it has a few downfalls here and again and while it may not be a classic, Death Magnetic, has an objective, a purpose, and it is built that way. St. Anger didn't even have that much. It just went no-where except bad.


Ian

GimmeKeef:

"Ian I have never cared for these guys so it would take a really glowing review for me to even re-visit them. Personally the music just drones on imho."

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I understand GimmeKeef. I am not a "thrash head banger" by character or trade (lol ) either

I heard all their albums and bootlegs but never purchased any of of them (friends of mine did and I heard their stuff right when it was released and over time a few discs and many tracks were given or sent to me). I am not above paying for anything I take an interest in (nor am  above paying for Metallica music) but all my friends bought their stuff so I always heard everything in it's entirety. As I was saying I can appreciate anything that is done well but I am not a Metallica Fan per say. I simply take an interest, give a good listen, and call it like I hear it more over.

Cheers,


Ian

It's a good album... The best since The Black Album... The problem with it is still the production... The drums sound, while miles better than St. Anger is still irritating... And other problem is the fact that the songs have too many ideas and changes. So after you listen to them, you can't really remember how they were... I don't know if I explained it well, but I think you get the point

The old songs were progressive too... But they had dinstinctive riffs, if you know what I mean

Maybe I need to listen to it more times though... It takes time for these kind of songs to sink in

I'm feeling generous, I give it a C+