Music Review: Metallica - Death Magnetic

Yes, as a matter of fact I AM aware of what I said before.
I was wrong.
See how easy that is?
You people should try it more often...but that's why I'm a better human being than you.
Why are you laughing?
Whatever....

Today, I was able to hear Death Magnetic in it's entirety. Today I FINALLY heard what *I* feel is the true follow-up to "...And Justice For All".
That's right...I'm going back to 1989 here people. Fuck the "Black" album and everything after....THIS is what you've been waiting for.

See, I remember when the Black album came out. I was working that day, and my friend Rob picked up my copy for me in between his classes at the time. As soon as I got home, Rob swung by to pick me up. The first thing I said when I got in his car was "WELL?"...knowing that he had been listening to it for hours at this point.
He said "It's cool....but it's different."
Of course this didn't bode well...no Metallica album was ever introduced as "cool but different" up until this point.
I remember driving around listening to it and just thinking "what the fuck happened here?".

Needless to say, that was the beginning of what would be a 16 year stretch of offerings from this band that would range from mediocre to just downright godawful.
For me, that is.

Today, I sat through Death Magnetic from beginning to end without interruption.
For the first time since 1989, I didn't feel like something was wrong. Everything felt right again.
But make no mistake, this isn't yesterday's metal coming from men nearing 50...this is something strong by it's own right.
As you listen, at times you'll hear the swelling punkish undertones of The Misfits....you'll hear bluesy metal grooves....you'll hear thrashy riffs with blazing drums....and yes, you'll hear Kirk Hammett soloing again. And it's not just the "Wah" pedal soloing that permeated everything they did in the 90's...it's DIRTY shit. Distorted sounds so deep that it almost reminds you of the unpolished Hendrix sound of the 60's at times.

This is Metallica being Metallica again. Not the thing that Bob Rock created and not the band that needed to "set their anger free" by force feeding us some underproduced....noise...it was fucking noise, wasn't it.?
THIS, is finally the evolution of this band that we all hoped was there somewhere.

Did Metallica re-write the metal handbook here?
Of course not.
As I said before, you can't expect that from the elderstatesmen of metal.
It's simply not fair.
That's something to be left to the young bands out there.

But what they *did* do was make a rock solid disc that old fans like me can finally be proud of.
They gave us something that we won't have to skip through to find the good stuff, because it's all good. (Well, except that "The Day That Never Comes" crap....I really do dislike that song, and I'll NEVER understand why that was chosen as the first single. I think you'll see when you hear this, that it really doesn't fit in with the rest of the disc's vibe.)

Let's be honest, it's not 1986 anymore...did you really expect Master Of Puppets 2?
Realistically, if you go back and listen to that disc now, it sounds dated, right?
You're hearing your memories more than anything else.
Yes, I understand how cool you were when you pulled in to the school parking lot with that badass Puppets riff BLARING from your Camaro while the jocks were listening to INXS, but you also had a mullet back then and those sunglasses with the leather side covers, and that would be pretty dated today too, wouldn't it?

Eh, there's no talking to you.

In closing I would like to welcome Metallica back.
Great job, Gentlemen!
Please continue keeping Bob Rock locked outside of the studio.