ST. ANGER

Contrary to the title, my review will be short and painless... Without any desire to bash one of my favourite bands of all times, this album is a truly un-inspired effort. I must admit that the sound is heavy enough and there is a raw atmosphere sprayed all over the 75 minutes of the record, that may appeal to heavy metal fans. The production and mastering of the album is definitely trying to support this approach...

Apart from that, there are 11 (relatively long) songs that present Metallica in an 'angry' mood (the title is representative), but without any sense of imagination, creativity and virtuosity. Here you have 75 minutes of pure metal sound, ranging from rock riffs to thrash beats but there is something missing... and that would be music. The album could have been produced by an amateur metal band that enters the studio for the first time. Surprisingly, there are no solos (!) in 75 minutes and the sound of the drums is at least annoying (some may disagree). A few pleasant moments appear in the first 3 tracks, but after 3-4 spins, I found myself not being able to go through listening to it again.

At that time, the band was returning after a couple of mediocre efforts (Load, Reload) that were not at the standards expected by their fans. Members of the band had personal problems and this has clearly affected their performance, finding them at the lowest point of inspiration. Indifference might be the ideal word to describe my feelings towards the guitar riffs, bass lines and monotone drumming on this effort. There is no need to go into much detail, judging from the fact that this is one of the very few (or probably the only) album that I cannot listen to again!

If you are a fan of raw metal, you can start with their debut. Apart from being a poor record, it has nothing to do with prog, or even experimental music.

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