St. Anger [Edited] [HyperCD/CD & DVD] - Metallica (CD 2003)

Metallica is subjected to a lot of unfair criticism. After making four of the finest thrashy metal albums of the '80s and '90s, everyone seemed to want to jump on the bandwagon to criticize works like Metallica, Load and ReLoad. But the black album and Load were honestly interesting stretches for the band, with a lot of lingering energy and only a few bombs. The criticism of ReLoad was more or less deserved; it was an album full of mediocre leftover tracks that just didn't have a lot of replay value. But nothing can compare to Metallica's return to the studio six years later, also known as St. Anger. The criticism of this album is 100% deserved; I can no longer refer to "Metallica" and even refer to the band I enjoyed in high school. St. Anger is an album that reflects the bumpy road the band has been down (losing bassist Jason Newsted and having singer/guitarist James Hetfield in rehab for alcoholism), and quite frankly, there's just nothing on this album that justifies listening to more than once.

Let's start with the fact that this album sounds bad, before we even touch on the fact that it is, in fact, the worst Metallica record ever produced. Possibly the most inexplicable thing about this entire debacle of a record is that the band kept career producer Bob Rock at the helm, and that the result sounds like a $1,000 demo CD. Imagine, if you will, a high school cover band recording a Metallica tribute album, and you'll get some idea of how unforgivably bad this record is. The snare drums have a tinny, echoing quality that resonates irritatingly into the hard pauses and penetrates even the full symphony of instruments. Not that that full symphony sounds good anyway -- the legendary Kirk Hammet's axe is mixed unbelievably far back into the album's mix. All of this sums up to the band being at an automatic handicap before one even begins to examine the tunes on their own merits.

There was a day when Metallica could overcome production barriers -- frankly, Ride the Lightning came before the band had mastered a great mix, but was still an instant classic. But St. Anger has absolutely nothing to make it worth listening to high-school-tribute-Metallica. For starters, Hetfield's voice is an absolute mess. A few of the tracks here, which do honestly attempt to elevate the band back to thrash, are relatively listenable until the vocals come in. Hetfield intones a flat, dull mix of vocals, which is often off-key in addition to lacking a barrage of melodies, growls and yells. It's difficult to catalogue all of the near-painful vocal abuses, mostly because it's hard to force oneself to listen to this CD more than once, but beginning on "Frantic," where the bridge kicks in the ultra-cheesy "Tick, tick, tick, tock," the album carries us through a lot of vocals that are just not there -- Hetfield has no idea where his own range is anymore, and even when he stays within its boundaries, he's singing it flat and uninspired.

The lead single "St. Anger" exemplifies this album's sole strength and all of its weaknesses quite well. It's got a few instrumental sections worth respecting (especially some of Lars Ulrich's drum fills), but even those sections are produced into a soupy mess, and Hetfield's vocals hang like a dreary cloud over the entire experience. In addition, the lyrics begin to point out just how contrived they are all over the place -- random macabre fare with no driving point, no context, and a lot of painfully awful throwaway lines ("I want my anger to be healthy" and the like). What's great about the lyrics (and this is in no way a strength for the album) is that you actually begin to laugh at the band after you've ceased mourning for their utter demise. "Shoot Me Again" basically speaks for itself -- you're literally begging someone to fulfill Hetfield's request by the eighth off-key repetition of the song's title. But for the most part, the lyrics are so awful that you're just begging for it to stop. Examples: "It's my world / You can't have it"; "Am I who I think I am? / Am I who I think I am? / Am I who I think I am?"; "God, it feels like it only rains on me"; "I just wanna get the f*ck away from me . . . / I hate it all / Why? Why? Why me?" I could go on and on, but I won't. These are the most worthless lyrics ever spewed from Metallica (a significant statement given some of their less-worthwhile experiments), and the fact that the vocalist spewing them does so horribly only continues to detract.

A lot of hype has been made about the fact that St. Anger is a return to the band's older days. But what all of this assumes is that the older days can be replicated with a few heavy riffs and killer drum fills. That assumption begs for a lot, though, and the fact that this album is full of poor lyrics that are poorly sung, all atop a poor mix of instrumentals, means that it's -- guess what? -- a poor album. This doesn't even cut to the heart of the matter, though -- what's really obvious is that the band just skated out this record knowing that many their fans would probably purchase a jewel case full of their feces. Well, guess what, St. Anger isn't much better. At least the feces would've had some connection to the band's former greatness; St. Anger does not. Metallica fans do not need to own this record; "Metallica" is no longer recording music and this record f*cking blows.