Number 50

It's been another gap between updating my favorite 100 CDs, but we're starting off with a good round number. Waltzing in at Number 50 is...

Metallica - Metallica (1991)

Remeber when Metallica rocked? I mean really rocked in that brutal, uncompromising take-no-prisoners kind of way. I do and here's the last time it happened, a "beginning of the end" in a way. After spending the 80's establishing a cult following as the best speed metal band on the tour circuit, Metallica slowed down and focused their sound to more of a hard rock feel. The result? One of the best selling albums of all time! The band gained fans and became the top hard rock band for the next decade. This fame and fortune would lead the band to turn their backs on what made them great to instead concentrate on finances and marketing (read: GREED) but when this album came out none of that had happened yet.

Metallica the album saw the band connecting with producer Bob Rock to tighten and successfully commercialize their sound. Starting in the early 80's, Metallica ranked side by side with Slayer as the best of their breed. Agressive speed metal with heavy riffs, fast beats, complex arrangements and snarling vocals were the order of the day. After spending all of the Reagan Administration dealing in what would be their creatively fertile period, Metallica decided a change was needed following the rambling, over thought (but not less powerful) ...And Justice For All album (1988).

Gone were the epic ten minute songs and in it's place were shorter, more consise songs. The classic "Enter Sandman" with it's sub-Sabbath riff and locomotive rhytm gained the band video and airplay that it never had before. Softer ballads like "Nothing Else Matters" and "The Unforgiven" added to their success by showing a softer (but not mushier) side. The Road saga "Wherever I May Roam" followed their Led Zep "Stairway To Heaven" style of build up to a T. Occasionally, the groups speed metal origins would leak out on the stampeding "Through the Never" and "The Struggle Within."

Best of all is the acerbic "Sad But True". "True" has another of those Sabbath style riffs layered under the barking vocals of James Hetfield. I love the song's attitude, how it soldiers on through adversity in the face of struggle and indifference. Another favorite is the rampaging rocker "Holier Than Thou". Maybe it's my distaste for my religious school upbringing that revels in how the song takes zealotry to task, but that opening line "No More / Crap rolls out your mouth again" and the chorus tag "Holier Than Thou / You Are / Holier Than Thou /You /Know not!!!" speaks volumes to me.

After this incredible high point, Metallica would take five years (!) off to raise families and buy mansions. When they returned, Metallica had gone from the leaders of rock to followers. They desperately foisted themselves on a Lollapolloza tour and cut their hair to blend in with Alternative acts. To make sure they didn't lose a single penny of their millions of dollars, they pursued the downloading program Napster with the ferocity of pit bulls fighting over a small piece of meat. The fact that the band's initial cult following grew out of home tape copying and they had already made enough money to run a small country meant nothing to them.

Other tracks, like the slamming beat of "Of Wolf and Man" or the bass heavy "The God That Failed" also were memorable. All in all, Metallica deserves it's classic status as a must have album. They have better albums, but none as well known as this one.