The "New" Metallica

Nothing is quite so difficult to digest as hype. A few years ago, Metallica was preaching loud and proud about how'd they'd changed the face of their music and still kept their legions of fans and were still and ever growing. Then they split with Jason Newsted, went to war with Napster, and fiddled around for a few years while James Hetfield battled with the demon liquor. Next on "Behind the Music," the end of an era...

Now they've got a new bassist from Ozzy's band (Ozzy has a band? I thought Ozzy just walked around in a confused daze, mumbling like the village idiot), who looks like one of Saruman's Uruk-Hai from Lord of the Rings, and a new album that's supposed to evoke the rip-roaring, speed-metaling, Motorhead-worshipping Metallica of Yore. And in true form, everything that's happened to the band since the Black Album is now being mocked in the music press. Load and ReLoad, formerly mere annoyances to old-school metalheads, are now shameful sell-outs to Alternative Nation (The "Alternative" scene was well and truly dead by the time Load was released, but never mind). Garage, Inc. is now a lame attempt at re-kindling the magic. And S & M, the band's double-live album recorded with the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, is now so embarrasing as to cause legions of fans to weep quietly in the night, clutching their bruised copies of Master of Puppets. Please.

S & M sucks? I didn't get that memo back when it was released in '99. Back then it was a bold musical experiment, that, unlike earlier rock-classical fusion attempts by the likes of Chicago, actually rocked. Nor do I recall the music critics throwing the hunks of dung at the other 90's albums that they pretend to have now that St. Anger is out. Consistency may be the hobgoblin of small minds, but it's a hobgoblin that could make some sense of our cultural narratives. Get that, you faux-intellectual wankers?

Incidentally, I've seen the video to the "St. Anger" and it's not bad. Maybe if Lars stops talking like a corporate drone, I may believe these guys are serious.