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Metallica: James Hetfield (vocals, guitar); Kirk Hammett (guitar); Robert Trujillo (bass guitar); Lars Ulrich (drums).
The world at large got a fly-on-the-wall view of the creation of Metallica's 2003 album, ST. ANGER, via the documentary SOME KIND OF MONSTER, so we know they consciously tried to keep things contemporary at that time by avoiding fleet-fingered solos and eschewing the sound of the "old" Metallica. If that hoary old term "return to form" ever applied to a rock album, though, it's ANGER's follow-up, DEATH MAGNETIC.
In the five years between the two releases, Metallica seem to have gotten back in touch with the raw power of their classic period, with a little help from legendary producer Rick Rubin. One listen to the 10-minute epic "Suicide & Redemption" with its mix of raw rock ferocity and complex musical development should tell you the old Metallica's back in business. Long tracks with complex structures and intricate, speedy riffs abound. Most appealing for longtime fans may be the return to the frenzied guitar solos of yore. Rubin seems to have assisted the band on a path that successfully combines power, melodicism, and pure, unadulterated metal mania, over a sonic statement that definitively proves there's nothing over-the-hill about middle-aged metal.

After The Black Album, Metallica got sexy. Okay, that’s really not the right word. But they did incorporate some measure of, um, erotica into their album covers. Load featured provocateur Andres Serrano’s semen combined with cow blood in the original piece "Semen and Blood III" and now Death Magnetic offers a sketch of a coffin that looks an awful lot like, well—how can we put this delicately?—a $&#^@. Notorious aesthete Lars Ulrich has got to be responsible, and we could go on for hours about how the vag-offin is a metaphor for our subconscious desire to return to the womb and stuff, but we have music to talk about. Music we haven’t heard yet, ’cause Metallica aren’t big on what we call "sharing." The few lucky journalists that have heard music liken single "The Day That Never Comes" to crossover "One" and allegedly the longer songs hearken back to their classic thrash era. Expect fuel, fire and hopefully that which you desire.

 

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