I've never been a fan of their music, but metal's not my thing. I always respected their ethos, though, and then the Napster thing happened and I'm not so sure. While I respect the fact that they took a stand on what they felt was a moral and economic issue regarding illegal downloads, I think many people saw them as greedy and anti-fan in their stance. I've taken enough law school courses on intellectual property law to know it's a complex issue and I'm not sure what my position really is, but I just thought the band could have tried to seem more fan-friendly on the issue. Did they REALLY think shutting down Napster would end illegal downloads and file-sharing???
That and the fact that Lars, whenever he speaks, makes me want to throttle him.
Posts: 3875 | Location: ATL, GA | Registered: 25 May 2004
Unfortunately, the first thing that comes to mind when mentioning Metallica, is a single word, sell-out. I loved them, and they used to be great. So many good songs it is hard to list them all: "Master of Puppets," "Seek and Destroy," "Sanitarium," "Ride the Lightning," "Enter Sandman," "The Unforgiven," "Battery," "For whom the bell tolls," "One." So much good rock was made in a short period of time, but unfortunately, the money got to them. They decided they needed their small and unneeded royalties, rather than to give back to the fans.
Posts: 3808 | Location: ZZ9 Plural Z Alpha | Registered: 18 October 2004
Sell out's indeed! Egos and attitude problems destroyed them. Lars is a whiny, spoiled brat, rich kid, tennis bitch who can't be bothered to practice drumming anymore as he is too busy complaining about people stealing his music. Shouldn't he be mad at Bob Rock for stealing the drum sequencing and half of the playing from him on And Justice For All too? He is the major reason they play such slow crap now, he simply can't keep up, and has no percussive creativity left in him whatsoever. James Hetfield is a redneck asshole who has needed someone to slap him around for quite a long time now. Kirk is a sad, sad waste of talent, whose confidence has been shredded to bits by the other two. Jason Newstead is a great bass player who was underutilized, misused and abused during his tenure in the band. Randy Trujillo is excellent as well, but is simply a hired gun in the eyes of the rest of the band. Cliff Burton, rest in peace, was the heart and soul of Metallica, without him the music feels empty. Ride the Lightning and Master of Puppets are two of the greatest metal albums of all time, no debate. Kill Em All is a wonderful hard rock/thrash album that makes me feel young again whenever I listen to it, same with the old school Garage Days albums. And Justice For All is infused with such sincere, emotional devastation at the loss of Cliff, that while is abscence is notable, his prescence is still felt. The Black Album is a great Bob Rock album, he could have made that album for almost any of the bands he has worked with, half of those songs could've worked even if his wife recorded them. Load, Reload, and S&M were absolute crap and destroyed whatever legacy and reputation was left, horrible songwriting, lazy musicianship and an image overhaul courtesy of Queer Eye for the Straight Guys. St. Anger made me laugh so hard while listening to it at the store that I never made it through the whole album, a shameless attempt to restore credibilty on their parts that was obvious and failed miserably, while still being an improvement on their last three albums. Everything post And Justice For All is like the Plant/Page and Coverdale/Page collaborations post Led Zeppelin, embarrasing and unneccessary.
"If it were beneficial, their father would produce children already circumcised from their mother. Rather, the true circumcision in spirit has become profitable in every respect." -Jesus, from the Gospel Of Thomas
One of the greatest rock bands ever, I agree. But more like they used to be one of the greatest bands ever.
They basically went down the crapper when Bob Rock got his grimey hands on their mixing boards. Anything from before the black album is amazing, Justice probably being my favourite, but Bob Rock just totally ruined the band.
Also, I saw them live for the first time just recently and although they were pretty tight, I was pretty underwhelmed by what I saw. James' voice sounded like a cross between Weird Al and a chipmunk and the sound was all muddy. I mean, it was cool seeing them live and all but I'd have to say they were the worst sounding band I have ever seen, hands down. Good times, bad sound. That's all....
quote:Originally posted by Mike: Unfortunately, the first thing that comes to mind when mentioning Metallica, is a single word, sell-out.
Metallica fell victim to the same fate as virtually every other uber-successful rock band. Success breeds complacency, which is why most bands are lucky to make three or four great albums. They're not exactly young bucks, either, and you wouldn't expect a group their age to crank out material as heavy as "Seek and Destroy" anymore, either. If you look at "The Four Pillars of Thrash" from the '80s (Metallica, Slayer, Megadeath and Anthrax) you'll see that the two groups who had multiplatinum smash albums quickly decended into mediocrity, while the other two continue to make enjoyable (if not groundbreaking) heavy music. So Metallica's decline might not be due to "selling out" as much as being old, fat and rich.
i was extremely disappointed w/their latest CD- the wort CD they have made. they have totally changed the way they play and their latest songs sound way too generic i agree with u mike- they r sellouts they lost their unique sound and crazy solos they turned rote on us in comparison to all other mainstream rock oh well we still have the albums ..and justice for all and master of puppets remember them for their good years
Haven't made a good song since "Sandman" but it's hard to write good songs when you've got to scower the world in search of anything anywhere that might possibly have some sort of arguably negative financial effect on you. Awesome they once were, in it for the money is all they have been since the late 90s.
________________________________________________________ "The music business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free, and good men die like dogs. There's also a negative side." - Hunter S. Thompson tinymixtapes.com / The Skinny / PopMatters
Metallica... yeah they've gone downhill, but they have still created several classic albums and a whole multitude of songs to which a generation of young and smelly headbangers have lived by. They are awesome, and, i mean, the talent can't have left their bodies that easily, i'm sure it's down in them somewhere. Enough to pull out a final decent album, maybe with one classic song before they die? Maybe with the help of a new producer? That's right, Metallica have finally turfed Bob Rock. All right!! Maybe. The new producer's name is Rick Rubin. And according to this site, they're releasing an album in the upcoming year. We'll have to wait and see, and it's best not to get your hopes up, but.. c'mon Metallica, pull an Iron Maiden, and climb out of the hole you and Bob Rock dug yourselves into. C'mon... for the new generation of young and smelly headbangers.. c'mon!
If anyone can rescue Metallica, it is Rick Rubin! I won't put anything past RR, he has the best ears and attitiude in the music industry. On a related note, I heard that there is a 20th anniversary edition of Masters Of Puppets in the works, with each song being covered by a different artist. I have only heard so far that Machine Head will cover Battery, and the almighty Mastodon will cover one of my favourite Metallica tracks ever, Orion! Sweet!
"If it were beneficial, their father would produce children already circumcised from their mother. Rather, the true circumcision in spirit has become profitable in every respect." -Jesus, from the Gospel Of Thomas
Originally posted by Smenkharon: If anyone can rescue Metallica, it is Rick Rubin! I won't put anything past RR, he has the best ears and attitiude in the music industry.
Rick Rubin or not, there's no way to make james, kirk, and lars into the same headbangers they were a decade and half ago. They aren't a metal band anymore, they don't have balls, they're just a bunch of posers making money off of a reputation that they haven't been able to live up to for a long time.
What pisses me off the most is, they screwed their true fans right in the @ss, because we were the ones that gave them that reputation and they turn around and shoved a 'load' in our faces.
Metallica=sell out money grubbin' corporate bitches. I don't have an ounce of respect left for those guys.
ok you guys are all retarded, you have no idea what you are talking about. Metallica is still the greatest band of all time. they are not greedy someone had to take a stand and they were the only ones with the balls too. second their latest album yes it was disappointing but you have no idea what it was about do you!, they wanted it to sound like a band that just got together(becuase they hadnt been together for awhile) like a garage band, thats why the album sounded like that, they also werent able to write things like they used to they came into the album with out any meterial they just started to play and thats how they wrote songs, look you all are retarded and shouldnt talk metallica kicks ass, kirk hammett is one of the greatest guitarist of all time.
Okay....Metallica were once my favorite band. I loved all of their pre-black albums, and have been a little confused by their moves since.
5 years after Black they release Load. I can remember gettin up early on Tuesday (summer no school), and driving my Mom's minivan to pick it up. The problem with Load isn't the music. Taken without consideration of the album that preceded it, Load is basic, if not inventive, blues rock. Slow, yes. But also more melodic. My point being that Load was the first album Metallica released that did not live up to expectations. Now, Load was their sixth album, so for a band to release 4 albums, after their debut, that have lived up to ,if not exceeded, expectations if quite incredible. I believe that since that time Metallica have just not known what to do. I mean they were a critically acclaimed band that were being panned now, and they can't figure out how to recover.
So they release more songs from the Load sessions title Reload. I think this was a mistake. After the bad notices that Load received, you would believe a rethink would be in order, but no.
Garage Inc. followed and they tried to make everyone remember them as a metal band. Didn't work. Then S & M. Two stopgaps are never a good idea.
And finally St. Anger. Just a search for credibility. Hopefully, Rick Rubin can restore some luster to the ol' Metallica logo.
Did anyone see the MTV Icons thing they did on Metallica a while back? It was like a tribute/concert thing with a few different bands playing their songs and various videos and interviews with the band. Sum 41 did a pretty decent version of "Master of Puppets," Korn played, they turned "Sad but True" into a rap song and had Snoop Dogg do it, and Metallica themselves played a song or two at the end.
Posts: 612 | Location: Oregon | Registered: 18 October 2005
I'm $ure it wa$ a $pecial event due to the fact that Metallica i$ all about the mu$ic and the arti$tic creativity. Rarely doe$ a band come along that focu$e$ on the art ver$u$ the money that can be made from $illy collaboration$.
Posts: 1206 | Location: Hunting in the Korengal | Registered: 04 January 2006
Originally posted by LordSmoogsbottomIII: Did anyone see the MTV Icons thing they did on Metallica a while back? It was like a tribute/concert thing with a few different bands playing their songs and various videos and interviews with the band. Sum 41 did a pretty decent version of "Master of Puppets," Korn played, they turned "Sad but True" into a rap song and had Snoop Dogg do it, and Metallica themselves played a song or two at the end.
That show was horrible, absolutely horrible. When Sum 41 put in the best performance, you know there's something badly wrong. Avril and her band were terrible, Snoop Dogg was beyond terrible and Korn omitted what was possibly Kirk Hammet's best ever solo from their performance of One. We'll probably never know if it was because neither of the band's guitarists could play it or because it would have made the song too long for MTV'S liking....
"I like pleasure spiked with pain and music is my aeroplane"
Posts: 15 | Location: Newcastle upon Tyne/Manchester (Uni.), England | Registered: 17 August 2006
