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After a very long wait, with all kinds of delays and all kinds of embarrassing events... like the whole Napster thing, then losing their bassist, Jason, and then the news that James is in rehab for alcohol and "substance" abuse.....the new Metallica album St. Anger is out, and it's a happy kind of anger. It has 11 new songs, some very long, as they should be, no 3 min. radio-ready black (blechk) album stuff here. It is about 75 min. long and full of crunchy goodness.

Now, St. Anger is a real throw back to the fast aggressive metal from the '80s. Not the Metallica sound of the '80s, mind you, but more like the sound of other metal bands at that time. If James was not singing it would remind you of the sound of Anthrax, or Death Angel, Slayer, or Mercyful Fate. Metal bands of the same genre, all with their own sound, but not the Metallica sound.

On first listen you hear right away they have a weird drum sound again, It's not the same weird drum sound they had on the Justice for All album, it's a totally new weird drum sound. The snare drum has a "ring/ping" sound instead of a "snap/crack", making it kind of flat and giving the whole thing an "unproduced/not so produced" feel.

Then, and I didn't notice this right away, there are no real solos anywhere. All of Kirk Hammett's noodling around is missing! But...and this is muy importanté...they are just jamming away. All the cool time changes return again, there are lots of starts and stops like the old days and tons and tons of way cool riffs all over the place. Lars is drumming his little heart out, like he is so happy to still have a band, when for a while there, it looked like it might have come to its end.

James's vocals are a little different. There is a lot of talk/singing, but then there are also the parts where he is pushing his voice to the point of cracking -- it sounds very emotionally driven, and it works...it's not a bad thing.

The lyrics are not quite what we're used to either. Not so many third person stories, more songs about "I" and "Me" and it reminds me sometimes of a Henry Rollins album with all this introspectiveness, (Looking inward and screaming about it, you know that has to be good! Right kids!?!) It feels very honest and from the heart, which is refreshing because done wrong it can be like quoting a bunch of 12-step program stuff and sometimes people fresh out of rehab just quote a bunch of rhetoric. But it seems to have helped James and I sure hope he can be strong and stay sober. It hasn't hurt his artistic-ness at all. This is an incredibly good album.

Also of note, St. Anger includes a DVD of them rehearsing THE WHOLE ALBUM with the new bass player, Robert, live in the studio. So you get the whole album twice. Wow. How often do you get to SEE a band play every song on their new release? I love it! This is a great idea, and it really gives you a sense of unity with the new member of the band, very classy; a nice way to include him in the new product since he joined too late to be on the studio album. The DVD is a great little (actually a big) extra for the fans! Nice going 'tallica.   

St. Anger is fantastic and I highly recommend it to all metal fans! I give it a Pheyev (that's 5 LEDs on a scale of 1--5, with "five" being the best and "pheyev" being "rock on, you righteous metal gods"). Go get it. :)

Count Poffula :)

"Information is not knowledge/Knowledge is not wisdom/Wisdom is not truth/Truth is not beauty/ Beauty is not love/Love is not music/Music is THE BEST!"
      --Frank Zappa 1940-1993