Written by Troy Killjoy on 07.10.2011 at 01:55
Exactly. It goes both ways, that's what happens when you make it big. You can never please everyone, but you can always disappoint someone.

This is very true. It's impossible if you're a big band to please everyone. And some people will disown a band once they make it big purely because they prefer it when a band is like some great secret that they think no-one else knows about. Metallica are a band that illicits blind praise and blind hate in almost equal measure, and I think because of this, many people cannot judge Metallica's music completely and totally on it's own merits. I personally think "Death Magnetic" has some great moments, but it's also a bit disjointed and messy. It's no way as good as the first 4 albums, but it's still a good album imo. And yes, no matter what a band does, they will disappoint someone. People bash Slayer for not changing, yet other bands get bashed for changing... you cant win!

Metallica has arrived with death magnetic. Definetely their best album since the black album, not saying that load,reload and st anger are bad

And then came LULU...

For the people who are old enough to have witnessed the vinyl era:
I consider Death Magnetic as a single with "All Nightmare Long" (the best song since "Blackened") at the A-side and "That Was Just Your Life" at the B-side.

I really hoped DM would be an omen of the rebirth of Metallica, a band that I used to purpose to be dead after the Black Album, a cd full of radio airplay stuff (except "The Struggle Within", a pretty cool song i.m.h.o.) and "(Re)Load" of Boredom and "St. Anger", on which Kirk seemed to suffer from muscle-contractions that restrained him from delivering any guitarsolo.

But now, after 4 years of waiting, we "enjoy" the album "Lulu" with Metallica as Lou Reed's escort band.

Once Metallica fired Dave Mustaine for drinking and fucking too much and forgetting to be a musician, now vengeance is at Dave & Co's side.

Http://img140.imageshack.us/img140/2656/mettoillica2tv4.jpg

A new style more agressive but they play more like they do in the past. A good one expect better for the future

Metallica returns to its roots and it's nice.
8,5/10

Very nice return to thrash but just some rough edges. "That Was Just Your LIfe" is a pretty good intro and sounds like something a great budding thrash band in the 80's would have written although it pales in comparison to something like blackened or battery. .5/5

I bet the next album will suck more than this one...

Metallica lost their way a long time ago and this attempt at past glory is only just passable. It feels clunky and the thing it does is highlight how far away they have drifted in the 90's and 2000's.
'All Nightmare Long' does sound like something that could have been forged in the 80s however, and there are some other commendable efforts.

Its a good comeback from the giant band Metallica, but it cant touch the greatness of the 80s. There are too many bad songs and the production is pathetic. And dont get me wrong but i cant stand Hetfields voice anymore. Metallica are overrated anyway.

Meh, even Load is better than this. This is such a half-assed attempt to win back the old-school thrash fans; a lot of mediocre songs (the bland instrumental Suicide and Redemption is especially a culprit) and a WAY-overproduced sound (just because you can make your album "louder", doesn't mean the album is going to automatically "kick ass", just saying ).

I barely listen to this any more. And I used to be a pretty big Metallica fan! I think there are three serious flaws with this album which are part of the reason I don't tend to listen to it:

1. The horrendous production. To sum up my problems with it, it's far too loud, the bass is practically inaudible and, even on low volumes, it's headache inducing.
2. The drumming is pretty poor. I know Lars isn't the best drummer in metal (I'd probably argue either Dave Lombardo or Gene Hoglan deserve that position, with a slight lean towards Hoglan after his awesome drumming on Testament's recent album), but his drumming on this is easily the weakest performance on this album (especially on some of the faster tracks, where he sounds like he's struggling to keep up with the music). Everyone else does pretty good, though.
3. The material is so consistently average (by thrash standards: by normal standards, it's not too shabby) that it's not funny. Exceptions being "Suicide And Redemption" (which I'm still convinced is a song they couldn't think of lyrics to and shouldn't have been released in the first place) and "All Nightmare Long" (which I think is pretty good by thrash standards and, had the production been more tolerable, probably would have been on my playlist of favourite songs).

I think this was a somewhat decent comeback. A bit better Black Album, and much better than Load and onward, but not as good as ...And Justice for All and albums before it.

The guitar hero version sounds way better than the cd version.

Written by deadone on 01.03.2014 at 00:36

This would've been an awesome album had Rick Rubin not fucked the sound up.

The songwriting is the real issue though, and this stuff is just pretty average compared to their first four albums. I don't think Rick Rubin was writing any songs here.

Hmm, speaking of overlong and repetitive, this album's 74 minute long length is undoubtedly one of the biggest issues, along with that atrocious production. Only enough songwriting here to justify an album half that long, and what actual songwriting there is is rather average.

What I think about Death Magnetic production.

That Was Just Your Life, All Nightmare Long, The Judas Kiss, Suicide & Redemption all had a lot of potential and with a little more tweaking and a less shitty production I would probably have revisited those songs from time to time. (those four songs alone are over 30 minutes so cutting some filler riffs/moments would have done a lot too)

This is not bad album, but it could be better. While some tracks are really good, especially "That Was Just Your Life" and "All Nightmare Long", others like "The Unforgiven III" and "Cyanide" are relatively mediocre. 67/100.

Heard this album today after a couple years.

Since it's release I must've heard several hundred albums and I can't help but feel that this album too was a gem in musicianship, songwriting and compositions. Much much better than the stuff I've heard since then.

It might have a couple weaknesses, but I think the biggest weakness is the name "Metallica" attached to the album. People hate the music even before it's released. I think Hetfield and company should make an anonymous band and then release a similar album, it'll be right up there on the top charts everywhere.

You know you screwed up when even St. Anger is better than this crap.

Why so much hate toward Death Magnetic?

I liked it. At least, it sounds better than what I was expecting. I remember that they introduce a new song on tour and people expected big turd from new album. Turns out it was good.

Production was big letdown.

Wow the guitar hero rip sounds much better than the "normal" version.

Written by Maco on 11.08.2015 at 04:48

Wow the guitar hero rip sounds much better than the "normal" version.

I have the CD but generally only listen to the GH version, the normal version is just a wall of sound. To me this album deserves better than its current 7.4 rating, but I guess its production works against it. I still don't understand how they could let it go with such a shitty production...

What's up with Metallica not having released a proper album since this one in 2008. Just a bunch of EP's and shit since.
That's a long hiatus.

Written by b0sse on 18.11.2015 at 20:03

What's up with Metallica not having released a proper album since this one in 2008. Just a bunch of EP's and shit since.
That's a long hiatus.

They're recording guitars as we speak. That means the drums are done already.

An awesome, band lost and post crisis, suckism period from load -re load - suck anger, basically good combacke, more thm roots (lates more garage punk), damn actually this is kick ass album, now after 10 years something I can apriciate it

Written by masterofpeace95 on 03.11.2011 at 01:40

Metallica has arrived with death magnetic. Definetely their best album since the black album, not saying that load,reload and st anger are bad

Load, Reload, and St. Anger were bad my friend. In fact, St Anger was an absolute abortion of a Metallica album. However, I will say if any other band (such as Linkin Park, koRn, Flyleaf, Drowning Pool, Disturbed, etc) had released St Anger, then it wouldn't have gotten so much hate.

Pretty decent, but not great. Too bad they screwed up the production big time, otherwise this could've been at least above average mainstream metal album.