Metallica - Hardwired...To Self-Destruct

  On 9/4/2016 at 2:53 AM, Bechuga said:

St. Anger is a better album if you remove St. Anger the song from the tracklisting. Then again, I'm that rare fellow that didn't really mind the snare, as strange as it was.

 

The snare sound is the least of that album's problems.  But yeah, the title song is especially hilarious.  I don't think I've ever heard a more awkward transition into a verse.  It's like they just threw a dart to determine which riff should be put where, and when.  And everything about those drums... wow.  What's up with those 3 extra loud kicks just kind of hanging out amidst the barrage of wimpy double kicks?  The whole song... what a clusterfuck.

It's funny, Frantic starts out so promising, but then it gets to that shitty clean guitar bridge out of nowhere and the whole album is just ruined from there, imo.. I really should try to re-visit it sometime.

Anyone heard this? It's actually kinda awesome:

edit: oh man, the intro of the title track quite possibly the most awkward thing they've ever recorded.. actually yeah the whole song is

  On 9/4/2016 at 8:34 AM, modey said:

 

edit: oh man, the intro of the title track quite possibly the most awkward thing they've ever recorded.. actually yeah the whole song is

Ahahahah right??  And that was the chosen single.  Never again will one song so perfectly encapsulate such an iconic band in the midst of a nervous breakdown.  They were just so lost and confused by that point.  It's kind of a fascinating album.  And one thing that hardly ever gets mentioned is just how sloppy Kirk Hammett's rhythm guitar is.  It is at least on par with Lars' drumming, possibly worse.  James Hetfield really is a force of nature, and it's remarkable he accomplished as much as he did considering what he was working with... bassists aside.  I can't really find any fault there.

Hence Hammet not playing a single riff in the studio from Ride The Lightening through Black Album.

Aye, with good reason.  James' rhythms on those albums are so precise and heavy.  One of the best rhythm guitarists out there, especially for that time period.

Yeah Hetfield is tight as fuck. He had his moments of slipping a bit, around the time of the St Anger tour, but he's really come back to his old precision lately.

I can definitely understand how he felt like the rhythm guitar side of the studio recordings was his domain, when Kirk started playing more rhythm around the Load/Reload sessions. That said, Kirk's guitar work on those albums was pretty great imo.

I should clarify that when I say it's a better album, it's still flawed to heck and back. My favourite song on there Invisible Kid has a catchy riff / verse, but those later sections where James is being all Jonathan Davis?

*cringes*

I tried to listen to it tonight, but just can't get over how awful the mix sounds. Even beyond the shitty snare. The bassdrum sounds like someone clicking a pen, the vocals sound like they've been pieced together in protools from many different recordings using vastly different microphones (granted, I think that's how it was done), all of the clean guitar tones are dull as fuck, it just sounds like a shitty demo. And everything is so dry! I don't even know how Bob Rock or whoever mixed/engineered this album allowed it to sound like that. I wish they'd filmed the mixing process.

It really is like a bunch of old rockers heard Korn, thought "yeah, let's make something like that" and completely missed the mark, not understanding what made that early nu-metal stuff good (yeah, I still consider the first three Korn albums to be good, deal with it).

  On 9/4/2016 at 3:27 PM, modey said:

It really is like a bunch of old rockers heard Korn, thought "yeah, let's make something like that" and completely missed the mark, not understanding what made that early nu-metal stuff good (yeah, I still consider the first three Korn albums to be good, deal with it).

I just found out Follow The Leader is their 3rd album and Issues is their 4th one, and not the other way around. Now I gotta go back and correct my thousands of Korn related posts where I refer to the albums chronologically and not by name ** cancels all plans for next week **

this is the pinnacle of metallica's career:

  On 9/4/2016 at 3:27 PM, modey said:

I tried to listen to it tonight, but just can't get over how awful the mix sounds. Even beyond the shitty snare. The bassdrum sounds like someone clicking a pen, the vocals sound like they've been pieced together in protools from many different recordings using vastly different microphones (granted, I think that's how it was done), all of the clean guitar tones are dull as fuck, it just sounds like a shitty demo. And everything is so dry! I don't even know how Bob Rock or whoever mixed/engineered this album allowed it to sound like that. I wish they'd filmed the mixing process.

 

It really is like a bunch of old rockers heard Korn, thought "yeah, let's make something like that" and completely missed the mark, not understanding what made that early nu-metal stuff good (yeah, I still consider the first three Korn albums to be good, deal with it).

I think that may be exactly how it went down.  But for me the thing that kills the production more than anything else is just how sloppy and out of sync with each other the rhythm guitars are.  Sounds like a messy diaper.  Even if they were just a little bit tighter the whole album would be much easier to listen to.  Granted, it would still sound like shit for the other reasons you mentioned.  Of course, bad vocal/drum takes contribute quite a bit to the overall ghastliness too.

Also that smooth jazz Enter Sandman vid is amazing.  Watched it many times over the years.

  On 9/4/2016 at 4:09 PM, caze said:

this is the pinnacle of metallica's career:

 

 hahah, vast improvement on the original.

I enjoy the rawness of St. Anger album mix, also the "fuck you" drum sound (except for more tender parts where it really sounds misplaced). St Anger song is fucking terrible though.

And yeah, some tracks are so badly played it hurts.

Ok now i want to watch "kids react to" Autechre !

  On 9/9/2016 at 7:51 AM, autechrist said:

Ok now i want to watch "kids react to" Autechre !

I would love that (and then get pissed on idiotic comments probably, lol)!

lol that was cooler than I expected

  On 9/4/2016 at 4:09 PM, caze said:

this is the pinnacle of metallica's career:

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBmM79YadYM

holy shit this is amazing.

I know practically nothing about metallica but i've enjoyed reading this thread. nice discussion my dudes.

Btw, guys, how is the Lulu colab album? Is it any good?

 We derided it. I can't remember a positive comment, but then again i didn't spend much time in that thread, and watmm has 'diverse' tastes.

I think modey had a couple positive things to say in that thread.  And that thread inspired me to listen to it again, with some positive results.

  On 9/9/2016 at 7:51 AM, autechrist said:

 

Ok now i want to watch "kids react to" Autechre !

BWAHAHA hooray for mankind thanks for linking this! i wanna adopt Anita!! <3

  On 9/10/2016 at 4:27 AM, Zephyr_Nova said:

I think modey had a couple positive things to say in that thread. And that thread inspired me to listen to it again, with some positive results.

Yeah, musically I thought it was awesome. Especially the ambience, and that one track where it's just an unrelenting thrash riff with moog guitar shimmering over the top. If they made an instrumental version it would have been like a different take on post-metal. The vocals are really not good though, and I think that's where most of the criticism comes from.

Sorry

Just for the lel

FLOL