Autographed CD insert from when I met Metallica in 1989
I really wanted to love the new Metallica album. I knew that this was the one that everyone was waiting for - the one where they were going to return to their true metal roots. The one that would take us back to those hard crunching metal days and pick up where Master of Puppets left off.
To some degree, I think it goes back, but a part of me- the ultra critical part of me, is having a hard time with it. I'm first questioning the recording itself. Like many of my newer CD's, once I put it on my iPod, it sounds blown out if I try and turn up the volume. And from what I've heard, I'm not the only one experiencing that problem. Seems like they are running it through some kind of compression process to boost the volume, but it actually ends up sounding worse than it should. I've listened to Death Magnetic 5 times on my iPod, and sometimes I can't make it through the whole disc because the sound quality is so poor. I'm not going to listen to it at a Grandmother level of "it's loud enough." I want to crank it up till my ears bleed, and this album just won't let me do that.
My next issue is that of James's vocals. I think on a number of the songs, that his vocals sound disconnected. Like they recorded it with him in an isolation booth and the rest of the band is jamming in another room having a great time without him. But maybe instead, it's that James is 45, is clean and sober, and has taken vocal lessons ever since blowing out his voicebox on the Black album. It's not the raw vocal style that drew me to the band in the first place, but a more refined sound that just doesn't speak to me the way it once did.
It just also might be that I'm too old to appreciate it for what it is. And I don't necessarily mean that I'm too physically old, but just that I'm no longer in a place where this kind of music appeals to me. With Metallica, I've always been a 1-2-3 girl - a Kill 'em All, Ride the Lightning, Master of Puppets kind of girl. Everything after that just hasn't been the same for me. Those 1st three albums came along for me when I was just 16-17 years old. I was a high school drop out moving around to live with various friends, then eventually living with my Grandmother and working a minimum wage retail job. I had no car, had to take the bus or bum rides everywhere- but during that time, music was my life. My paychecks went towards new albums, concert tickets and gas money for someone to take me to the concerts. This was also the time when I was totally and completely in love with someone that did not express those same emotions for me. This was the guy that I'd sit and cry over, sitting in my room at a friend's house listening to Fade to Black over & over and over again just crying my heart out wanting John to feel the same way about me...
When And Justice for All came out in 1988, my life had completely changed is a really short period of time. My pining for John was gone, and at 19, I met the man that I would eventually marry. Early in 88, we moved in into our apartment and are still together to this day. And Justice for All was a pretty damn good album, but I just wasn't in that same space anymore- that place of teen anger, frustration, and angst. And so by that time, they still might have still been one of my favorite bands, but it's like And Justice for All was just another metal album that came out in the late 80's and I just didn't see it in the same way as I did the previous three albums.
And it's kind of been like that for me ever since. Even though I've stayed faithful to Metallica from 1985 on, through people saying that they "sold out" on the Black album, to the whole Napster bullshit, I bought every new album, every video, went to the concerts, but it was never the same as seeing them in 1986, opening for Ozzy on the Ultimate Sin tour. Cliff Burton banging his head and hair flying...
That time is just gone to me. It's dead. It will always be remembered, but nothing that comes along afterwards (by Metallica) is going to pack that same emotion, because I'm just not in that space any more. But don't get me wrong. I've found boatloads of new music over the years to feed my emotions- whatever they may be. I'm just not ever going to be an angst ridden teen again, and as good as this album may be, it's going to probably speak to other people more than it will to me.
For anyone out there that's feeling the same way I am, take my friend Karl's advice. Karl hasn't been able to get through the album either. He said instead, that he's been listening to "Live Shit..Binge & Purge."
Fuck.... I forgot all about that set. I'm not sure I've even listened to it in the 15 years since it's been released. I quick slapped it on my iPod late Thursday night and listened to the whole thing, all three discs- twice all day at work on Friday. And more in the car today... And you know what? I can listen to all that and it's like a wormhole in time rips open and pulls me back - even just for a few moments. I can close my eyes and it's 1985...86...88...91... And I think that's about as far as I really want to go.
On to new things.
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