The case against Metallica

[prokop]

A little sensitive issue, so let's argue for a bit people.
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For good manner sake, I'm grown up on Metallica as any good metal fan. Their early albums are a (vulgar) display of genius, pure and simple - after all, Metallica came and changed an entire genre of music.

I was a hardcore Metallica fan for a long, long time - until one sad day around '99, I woke up and realized that they simply started sucking. And sucking bigtime.

Gone were the days of extended length tracks - uncompromizing the artistic creativity while maintaining a popular base, gone were the dissident lyrics - displaying an hard core of criticism towards the established world, and gone were the ingenious riffs and long melodic solos.

Disaster stroke around Black Album. Suddently Metallica became easy to digest for the mainstream public, with newfound "pop-ified" sound, shorter tracks, and easier to remember (when drunk), less-political lyrics.

For most Metallica fans, the Black album marked a change away from their initial concept of music-first eksperimental trash metal towards more eatable version ultimately leading to embarrassing numetal attempts and complete schizophrenia and obvious lack of inspiration on the newest of albums.

The issue is, at least for me, the total turn away from political, extrovert, uncompromizing metal towards introspect, uncreative self-therapy. The reasons behind are pretty clear, Metallica is a multimillionare business, absolutely incapable of being angry at anyone else but the kids that are (stepping on their lawn) copying their music.

Hetfield sounds like an alcoholic middleaged badboy (which he is), Ulrich's wildest idea is to change drums to form a new sound for Metallica on "some kind of monster" and Newsted quit the band citing creative bankrupcy, starting a new project (Voivod).

In short, in my view these sorry guys are no longer the propagandized "kings of metal", but sorry hard-rocking washouts.
In the case you disagree, watch the unwittingly hilarious band dvd Some Kind of Monster, Amazon. It shows clearly what's going on in the band, Hamett is prancing around in a white cowboy costume, Hetfield is on rehab an in disbelief in the creative method, Dave Mustaine complaining about being kicked out of Metallica and always settling for being number 2 with Megadeth (dream on Dave) and Ulrich just sounds coked out. (Don't miss his hippie father telling that Metallica's new material sucks)

the abbreviated discography
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Kill 'Em All
Ride The Lightning
Master Of Puppets
...And Justice For All
Black Album
Load
RE-Load
Garage Inc.
S&M
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[jason]

I conceded long ago, shortly after Pantera's The Great Southern Trendkill that Metallica had been unseated as the primary influence in metal. Of course, the groundwork they established is critical in the continuing development of the genre.

The question I have though is; how did the Black album influence music to change? By bringing metal to the forefront, it brought a whole lot of new ideas to the world. Whether or not I like those ideas, I'm glad they came for me to decide.

 

[prokop]

Could you explain more about waht you are thinking of?
What new ideas to the world ?

 

[jason]

The Black album is probably solely responsible for bringing metal to the mainstream. By bringing metal to the mainstream, it has opened up a world of new music (modern mainstream/popular metal). There's not point in defining specific ideas/songs/albums/genres, it's the general idea the Black album had an impact on many young artists, and their music has since reflected as much.

 

[erikbartley]

I agree with jason. Have either of you seen the DVD of the black album from the Classic Albums series?

 

[StuckOnBandaid]

I too grew up with Metallica, but I think what happened is that they lost their edge. I honestly think they got caught up in commercialism and probably got greedy. Their earlier work is much more raw and genius, and is still loved today, but the last thing I heard about Metallica was when they were fighting Napster.

 

[Leigh]

Sadly I think this happens to a great many bands. They start of with the raw energy and unique sound and just become too popular. The big boys want a piece of the cation and to some extent corrupt what were extra ordinary bands into square pegs to fit square holes.
Such a shame really but inevitable when they become too popular.

 

[Conservationist]

Suddently Metallica became easy to digest for the mainstream public, with newfound "pop-ified" sound, shorter tracks, and easier to remember (when drunk), less-political lyrics.
...
The issue is, at least for me, the total turn away from political, extrovert, uncompromizing metal towards introspect, uncreative self-therapy.

The crowd likes something it can recognize as being as neurotic as itself. Metallica sold out, as the saying goes, but they were replaced by better music anyway. Their peak I think was Orion, a song that would love to be classical.

 

[doctortornface]

Ah so here we go again,the old metal trendy argument,Metallica have sold out,not as good as the last album ,not as good as the first album ,not as good since Cliff Burton died..INSERT AS REQUIRED. I too have listened to Metallica for a long time and what you see as "Selling Out" I see as natural progression.No band with any talent stays the same. If we said the same about say, the Beatles,then she loves you should have been as good as it got for them,Sgnt Pepper would never have been made.Although they also have the problem of past members.If Pete Best was still here things would be better....? When a band is around for a long time and as sucessful as Metallica then all sorts of musical changes happen,some you will like some you won't.
What is it with metalers,that draws them into smaller and smaller groups...I am more metal than you because I only like deathblackgindoperaticorangeyflavouredmathgorecore...... I have heard all the arguments , although the one that particularly wrankles is as though metal is some sort of norse god religeon.....It is music,and on occasion great music,but I cannot handle elitist bollox, like this.I suppose Sepultura are rubbish now....since roots, since Max left...once again insert as required.Now don't get me wrong here,if you don't like Metallica for almost any reason thats cool, so long as it's your reason and not some trendy Metal forum mafia nonsense.And as for selling out? It never occured to them,they just make music.

 

[ironcarcass]

From the black album, Metallica became boring...

 

[doctortornface]

I didn't like St.Anger when it first came out so I left it sitting in the rack.Went back to it a few weeks ago and it's growing on me...

 

[Fretless]

I personally didn't find any of the Metal Elitist attitude in the original post. Prokop gave solid reasons for not liking Metallica any more. I agree with much of what he said--I actually lost a bunch of interest in Metallica with ...And Justice For All. The songs were too long, too repetitive, and the sound production was too cold and sterile.

I had no problem with them cutting their hair or moving (progressing) on to a different style. The Black Album was still a collection of quality songs, just not very metal. Load and ReLoad I found very uninteresting. I think the albums are of good quality, but I think other bands do what Metallica did on them much better. But as Some Kind of Monster demonstrates, it's kind of obvious that Metallica couldn't really move anywhere constructive with all of the issues going on. I found that documentary to be rather painful to watch, and only was able to get through about half of it.

 

[Conservationist]

I personally didn't find any of the Metal Elitist attitude in the original post. Prokop gave solid reasons for not liking Metallica any more.

I agree. If anything, the poster attacking him is a loyalist for saying Prokop was foolish for not listening to Metallica, even if he feels the musical quality has gone down. It has. It is simply not as interesting to a high-interest fan as it used to be.

Of course, such is the case with almost all bands, and the opposite is true of many classical composers: they improved as they aged.