.co.uk
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Called "the Black Album" by many (due to its
monochrome cover), Metallica marks the group's entrance into the
mainstream, with shorter songs, simpler song structures and
slower tempos overall. That said, this is an excellent album,
featuring some of the best songwriting Metallica has ever done.
"Enter Sandman", "Wherever I May Roam" and "God That Failed",
despite being slower and more groove-oriented than the band's
earlier work, feature the same heavy riffs and heavier rhythms
that have always been a feature of Metallica's music. The band
goes introspective with "Unforgiven" and proves that they can
write a ballad with "Nothing Else Matters", which succeeds better
than one might expect. Overall, this is a high-energy album
despite its laid-back approach and is in many ways superior to
the previous ... And Justice for All, which was weakened by
overly complicated song structures and mediocre production.
--Genevieve Williams
BBC Review
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Any attempt to move away from a tried and tested
formula is often met with resistance by some fans who never want
their idols to change. Smarter than your average heavy metal
band, the more complex turn-on-a dime twists of their previous
albums, Master Of Puppets and 1989’s And Justice For All, were
trimmed back in favour of a more honed-down delivery. Though the
band didn’t always see eye to eye with Bob Rock (who had
previously cut his teeth engineering for the likes of Bon Jovi
before producing Motley Crue’s Dr.Feelgood), the tensions between
the two camps resulted in an album bursting at the seams with
alternative ideas.
Sure enough, accusations that they had sold out came from the
rump of hardcore fans within seconds of their fifth album being
released in 1991. Several years later thousands of fans signed an
online petition calling on the band to sever its links with Bob
Rock such was their conviction that their beloved Metallica had
strayed from the straight and narrow.
Yet his involvement gained them mass sales (number one on both
sides of the Atlantic) and earned them the Grammy they’d missed
out on, having lost out to Jethro Tull’s Catfish Rising the
previous year. With millions of new fans going on to discover
their back catalogue, Metallica moved from cult metal gods to
bona fide rock stars, straddling the airwaves with the
psycho-dramatics of “Enter Sandman”, whose terse motifs served
notice that things were changing. The spaghetti western set
dressing of “The Unforgiven”, “Nothing Else Matters” with its
sensitive lyrics and string section embellishments, as well as
the widescreen dynamics of “My Friend Of Misery” demonstrated how
keen they were to move things on.
In “The God That Failed”, vocalist, rhythm guitarist and
principle writer, James Hetfield deals unflinchingly with
parental loss and the contradictions of faith in a mature and
considered manner. The confidence exuding from almost every track
isn’t due to a clichéd, puffed-up HM swagger but a result of
literate and articulate artists breaking free of generic
expectation. --Sid Smith
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