Metal Music Blog

As I mentioned few days ago, I have been reading a book of Metallica (Justice for All: The Truth About Metallica), and I promised to write a review of the book. So, this article is my review of book “Metallica”, written by Joel McIver. In this review I describe how the book is written and what kind of content there is, as well as what is my personal experience of the book.

Joel McIver (born 1971) is a rock journalist, author and musician, who has written to magazines such as Record Collector, Metal Hammer, Total Guitar and Kerrang! He has also written Extreme Metal, Queens of the Stone Age: The Unofficial Story, Nu-Metal: The Next Generation, Slipknot: Unmasked, Ice Cube: Attitude and Erykah Badu: The First Lady of Neo Soul.

Justice for All: The Truth About Metallica is an uncensored story of the world’s biggest and best known metal band. As a metal band Metallica has revolutionized the whole field of heavy music with their classic albums Master of Puppets, …And Justice for All and Black Album. This big music epos tells the interesting story of Metallica from early day’s drunken club gigs to today’s gigantic stadium concerts. The book also tells about the endless tours around the world, the death of bassist Cliff Burton, rehabilitations and many other things you do not hear daily. In this book of Metallica, author Joel McIver cuts off the myths connected to Metallica during the years, reviews every single album and DVD and describes how heavy music has evolved from 1980’s to these days. Foreword of the book is written by Thomas Gabriel Fischer from Celtic Frost.

McIver uses lots of interviews of other known bands, producers, staff and other people who have worked with Metallica, as a basis for the story. For example, McIver has interviewed people like Mikael Åkerfeldt (Opeth), Tom Araya (Slayer), Jeff Beccera (Possessed), John Bush (Anthrax, Armored Saint), Max Cavalera (Soulfly, Sepultura), Jeff Dunn (Venom), Scott Ian (Anthrax), Sean Harris (Diamond Head), King Diamond (Diamond Head, Mercyful Fate), Ian “Lemmy” Kilmister (Motörhead), Dave Mustaine (Metallica, Megadeth), Jason Newsted (Metallica, Voivod), Steve Tucker (Morbid Angel) and many other interesting persons.

The book contains 25 chapters as well as the foreword, introduction, list of sources, discography, Internet links and an index. The book I read (translated to Finnish) contains 440 pages, written in small font and line space. Shortly said, there is very much to read. For Metallica fans this book is a great source of information. For those looking for quick information of Metallica this book might be too big to read.

Joel McIver writes very much, more than half of the book, about Metallica in 1980’s, which is absolutely great. McIver stars the book by introducing Metallica members and describing their youth. He continues by telling how Metallica was born and how they quickly reached a number of fans in Bay Area. Additionally McIver tells much about how trash metal was born and developed during the early 80’s. There are lots of great details of Metallica and band members in this book. For example, James Hetfield was 15 or 16 he went to a festival with his friend who had cut his ticket into smaller pieces and sold them as LSD rags. The money he got was used to beer. James was amazed and thought “man, what kind of business is THIS“? Another interesting story was about the first time Lars and James played together. Lars had been looking for a band and somehow he came across with James. Lars and James played together, and James thought “Lars must be the worst drummer in this world”! Lars was not able to stay in rhythm with his lousy drum set that included only one symbal. The symbal holder collapsed every now and then and guys had to stop playing until Lars rebuilt his drum set.

Joel McIver continues by talking about Bay Area trashers, gigs in San Francisco, glam rock bands and the birth of trash metal. He also describes how Cliff Burton joined the band and how Metallica survived their early years as homeless dudes in New York. McIver describes how Kill ‘Em All, Ride the Lightning and Master of Puppets were born and how Metallica started to become the number one trash metal band in scene. He talks about the death of Cliff Burton and the details of those that tragedy. McIver continues the story by describing how Jason Newsted joined the band and how the great …And Justice for All album was created and why there is no bass almost at all.

After talking much about Metallica in 1980’s, Joel McIver continues by describing how Metallica recorded garage albums and their best known album, Black. At this point Metallica started to loose their popularity and band members had difficulties with alcohol and each others. Joel McIver provides many details of those difficult times of Metallica.

After year 2000 Metallica has started to become popular again. Joel McIver tells about Load and Reload albums and gives his staggering review of those two, probably the worst Metallica albums ever. McIver tells about the Napster conflict and how Jason Newsted left the band. Finally McIver describes how Metallica went to rehabilitation and came back with new energy and attitude.

Justice for All: The Truth About Metallica is great. I love it. There is so much interesting details of the early days of the band, members of the band and other bands on those days. There are lots of interviews of known metal bands, good album reviews and a number of great pictures from early days to 2000. The book is just fantastic and I have nothing to complain. It is never boring and there is enough to read. The content is good and well organized and McIver’s approach is analytic and straightforward. I thought many times “isn’t there anything negative in this book” and I just was not able to find. This book is great, fantastic and fabulous. It is an awesome story of an awesome band. If you are interested in Metallica, trash metal and 1980’s metal music, get this book. You’ll love it!

All pictures from Metallica homepage and MySpace site.

Lately I wrote about the very best trash metal album of 80’s which in my opinion is Metallica’s Master of Puppets. Additionally I am currently running a poll in right sidebar in which I ask you to name the best trash metal band of 80’s. I discussed about this same topic with dudes at work and I also got good comments for my article. Now I would like to extend this topic a little bit.

The year was 1987. I was a teenager hanging around with my skateboard, drinking booze and acting like an idiot. I lived in hell and I was lost. I released my hate in various ways and I was stupid. In all that shit I had one great passion, metal music. I listened to Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, Stone, Anthrax and especially Metallica’s Ride The Lightning album. Man, I loved that album! It was full of energy, rage and aggression. It was furious and it was fast. And I just loved it. It was my passion number one. I fell asleep by listening to it and I woke up to play it on again.

I discovered Metallica when a friend of mine, another troubled teenager, showed me his vinyl albums. I remember how Fight Fire With Fire did sound different, aggressive and furious. I fell in love. I was amazed with the beautiful melodies of Fade To Black and the epic Creeping Death. Even though I listened to Fade To Black probably too many times, the very best track in that album was The Call Of Ktulu, the awesome instrumental monument.

I grew up in northern Finland, behind the back of God. We reached American music always later than others in the world. One day my friend said, “Now I have something really staggering to show you”! We went to his home which was always empty because mother and father used to spend their days in the local bar. We sat down as I started to hear guitars from loudspeakers. After the fabulous guitar wall a fast riff started. The album was Metallica’s Master Of Puppets and I was in flames. Since that moment my most played album was Master Of Puppets. I did not listen to Battery or Master Of Puppets tracks so much because I was into The Thing That Should Not Be, Welcome Home (Sanitarium) and Disposable Heroes. May be the best lyrics in the album were in Leper Messiah, while the very best sounds were in Orion. This instrumental and almost orchestral masterpiece showed the spectacular skills and talent of Cliff Burton.

So I lived my youth with those two great albums. In year 1988 Metallica released their new album …And Justice For All. Metallica was already much more popular than few years before, so we got the album in our hands before the end of the year. I expected a lot from that album and I got more. It was a stunning album with many masterpiece tracks, brilliant metal pieces. As said in the beginning, I do not consider Black Album as Metallica’s best album, even though many people do it. In my opinion the best album is …And Justice For All. Now, the interesting point is that this album is not actually as much trash metal as the previous albums. It is much more progressive, twisted and sensitive. It was a bit different. I loved the earlier Metallica albums but I found this new album very interesting because of the lyrics and progressive sounds. As you listen to nine minutes long …And Justice For All track, you hear the difference to earlier material. May be one of the reasons why I consider the album the best is the track called One. Another reason is Damage Inc., which is definitely a real trash metal piece.

While …And Justice For All album is not as trash as earlier ones, I really like the progressive touch and lyrics of the album. Metallica fans know that the album has almost zero bass, so why on Earth I consider it the best one? Yes, there is no bass because it was mixed away. Ok, of course it is there, but bass is there only to support guitars and that’s why the album sounds like there is no bass at all. Why do I like it? As said above, I really like the progressive sounds, lyrics and the masterpieces such as Blackened, …And Justice For All, One, Harvester Of Sorrow and Damage Inc. Master Of Puppets is the very best trash album of 80’s, but …And Justice For All is the best Metallica album of all time. This is how I see it, or should I say how I hear it. This is my experience while majority of headbangers do not agree. Finally, there is just so much feelings related to that album and my life that I feel the music in that album is the best from Metallica.

So, why I do not consider Black Album as the best one? Because it sounds “produced”. There is no feeling as in previous albums and it goes too much towards pop. I just hate Enter Sandman and the rock sound in it, but I like the heavy riffs of Sad But True. The Unforgiven is played too much in radios and Nothing Else Matters buries the trash band. There is one track I like and it is My Friend Of Misery which has a great bass intro. I do not rate Black Album as best Metallica’s metal album. Black album is a heavyrock album.

You probably noticed that I did not even mention the albums after the Black Album. I am sure you know the reason.

Guten Morgen! It is Sunday morning here in Finland and I am reading a book of Metallica, written by Joel McIver. I will write a review of the book on next week, but first I need to finish my reading. I feel lazy today (as always), so I will not write much today. Instead I provide you a video from Metallica’s MySpace site. Yesterday I wrote about Great Metal Music Album Covers and I considered adding Metallica’s Ride The Lightning album cover to my list. I also like the Black album cover because of its simplicity. Well, I did not add them this time, even though they are great albums with great covers.

Metallica is an interesting band, by the way. The book I am reading right now provides much interesting information of Metallica’s early days and career. Metallica was one of the first trash metal bands in Bay Area in United States and they are considered as one the most influential bands in trash metal scene. When I heard Metallica’s Ride The Lightning first time in early 80’s, it was really different from other bands on those days. It was fast, furious, cruel and aggressive. Immediately I got very interested in the band and since those days Metallica has been one of my favorite trash metal bands. I will tell more about the book in my review, so stay tuned. So far I can say the book is pretty good and there are lots of interesting details of the band. I will provide you few great examples in my review. Meanwhile check out the video which is a compilation of all Metallica music videos between 1989-2004.

This dude is great, I mean GREAT! I just love piano versions of classic metal songs and this one is almost on the top of my list. This guy is damn good with his piano and he just plays Metallica so well. I would like to get a CD full of piano versions of classic metal songs, played by some pro pianist. Is there any?