Album of the Weekend

Metallica-St. Anger

St Anger is better than Load/Re-Load. It's not the best Metallica album but it's the most underrated and over bashed album I've seen. St. Anger isn't a passionate album-I totally disagree with the critics that say it "brings back passion" to Metallica-but that just shows how good they were at one point. Imagine if they released St. Anger in the early 80's when they still had the edge and hunger. That they can do this good without those factors shows how good they were. 

It's hard to sing about anger and rage when you live in mansions. No, that doesn't mean rich people can't write great music. It also doesn't mean that you shouldn't be compensated for your artistic production. What it does mean is "What do these guys have to be angry about? That their housekeeper didn't dust the the ivory fireplace?" 

Oddly though, this album still has some really great songs. "Some Kind of Monster", "Frantic" and "Invisible Kid" are pretty good. They have the longer style thrash metal sound that is certainly adequate. While it's true the album misses Jason Newstead badly, their longtime producer Bob Rock fills in for him. As a metaphor for the entire album-Bob Rock is no Newstead but it's the best they can do at the time period.