Metallica Superthread -All Metallica discussion goes in here

lord lucan

scudzilla wrote: »

Is there any video out there of Cliff playing Orion? Searched everywhere with no joy

I'm almost certain that cliff never played it live.

lord lucan

jack presley wrote: »

According to this, they didn't play it live until 2005 which I find bizarre.

http://www.metallica.com/song_list.asp

I think it being regarded as cliffs song and that it was played at his funeral meant the band steered clear of it. Only post rehab/skom /St. Anger could they look at it again, especially with the 20th anniversary of MOP on the horizon in 2006.

Same goes for Anaesthesia (pulling teeth), it held a sort of reverence for James, lars and Kirk, never got played until Robert unexpectedly pulled it out during the 30th anniversary. Hetfield looked like he was about to cry when he started it.

ozzy jr

Speaking of songs they've never played live. Any reason for not playing Astronomy? Or have they played it and I missed it?

jack presley

ozzy jr wrote: »

Speaking of songs they've never played live. Any reason for not playing Astronomy? Or have they played it and I missed it?

According to that link I posted above, they've never played Astronomy live. Couldn't tell you why though.

KH25

Astronomy is fantastic. One of their best covers.

Lithium93_

Little bit more information about the new album coming out slowly but surely, this time courtesy of Kirk Hammett.

He's described the album as ''a bit more progressive'' and name checked last years standalone Lords Of Summer, Death Magnetic, ...And Justice For All

http://metalhammer.teamrock.com/news/2015-04-16/metallica-music-more-prog-kirk-hammett

Mental Mickey

lord lucan wrote: »

I think it being regarded as cliffs song and that it was played at his funeral meant the band steered clear of it. Only post rehab/skom /St. Anger could they look at it again, especially with the 20th anniversary of MOP on the horizon in 2006.

Same goes for Anaesthesia (pulling teeth), it held a sort of reverence for James, lars and Kirk, never got played until Robert unexpectedly pulled it out during the 30th anniversary. Hetfield looked like he was about to cry when he started it.

Link?

lord lucan

Mental Mickey wrote: »

Link?

This is the best one i can find. Looking at it now, Kirk looks the most sombre of them all, he was closest to cliff I think so may explain it.

https://youtu.be/TSoCpG4Tzko

zcorpian88

lord lucan wrote: »

This is the best one i can find. Looking at it now, Kirk looks the most sombre of them all, he was closest to cliff I think so may explain it.

https://youtu.be/TSoCpG4Tzko

He did a better version at the Orion festival in 2013 when they played Kill em' All in its entirety on the DEHAAN stage, Cliff's dad was sitting just on the side of the stage. Rob even had a Cliff tribute bass :P

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TP7STLuJxRI

Wrongway1985

When Orion was played at the RDS gig in 06 it was being played for just the 8th time.

Wrongway1985

ozzy jr wrote: »

Speaking of songs they've never played live. Any reason for not playing Astronomy? Or have they played it and I missed it?

Strange that as they have played Veteran of the Psychic Wars acoustically.

scudzilla

Lithium93_ wrote: »

Little bit more information about the new album coming out slowly but surely, this time courtesy of Kirk Hammett.

He's described the album as ''a bit more progressive'' and name checked last years standalone Lords Of Summer, Death Magnetic, ...And Justice For All

http://metalhammer.teamrock.com/news/2015-04-16/metallica-music-more-prog-kirk-hammett

The band don't half talk some crap in the lead up to album releases, heard it all before

zcorpian88

scudzilla wrote: »

The band don't half talk some crap in the lead up to album releases, heard it all before

They haven't even said who's producing the album yet, is it going to be Rick Rubin or what? They are keeping that fairly quiet. Hopefully the dynamics aren't compressed as f**k like on DM on the follow up.

King George VI

scudzilla wrote: »

The band don't half talk some crap in the lead up to album releases, heard it all before

Sure didn't they say Death Magnetic was going to be eastern sounding before it was released.

briany

Johnny Carson wrote: »

Sure didn't they say Death Magnetic was going to be eastern sounding before it was released.

Not really. He was talking about a specific musical section, which turned out to be that cool breakdown in Suicide & Redemption before James' solo. And it did sound pretty eastern. Little bit of the old Spanish Phyrigian, maybe. :pac:

Mental Mickey

scudzilla wrote: »

The band don't half talk some crap in the lead up to album releases, heard it all before

Mainly Lars

King George VI

briany wrote: »

Not really. He was talking about a specific musical section, which turned out to be that cool breakdown in Suicide & Redemption before James' solo. And it did sound pretty eastern. Little bit of the old Spanish Phyrigian, maybe. :pac:

Ahh right. Good ol' Spanish Phyrigian. Can't go wrong. Wasn't the mid section of Cyanide in Spanish Phyrigian, or Phyrigian Dominant? I should really brush up on scales and modes.

briany

Just reading a bit of Mustaine's autobiography there and coming into the chapter(s) on his time with Metallica. Don't remember ever reading about that Brad Parker guy (a singer the band had hired very briefly who went by the stage name 'Damien Phillips') ever before. Heard of most of the other bit players in their early years. Mustaine comes off as a bit conceited in some of his recollections. On his audition for the band he speaks of getting hired just after setting up his gear and tuning up, playing a few riffs and whatnot, while the rest of the band were in another room. 'I knew I was pretty good, but I didn't know I was that good.' OK, Dave. I seem to remember a lot of his early playing on those recordings being a lot more speed than substance.

scudzilla

briany wrote: »

Just reading a bit of Mustaine's autobiography there and coming into the chapter(s) on his time with Metallica. Don't remember ever reading about that Brad Parker guy (a singer the band had hired very briefly who went by the stage name 'Damien Phillips') ever before. Heard of most of the other bit players in their early years. Mustaine comes off as a bit conceited in some of his recollections. On his audition for the band he speaks of getting hired just after setting up his gear and tuning up, playing a few riffs and whatnot, while the rest of the band were in another room. 'I knew I was pretty good, but I didn't know I was that good.' OK, Dave. I seem to remember a lot of his early playing on those recordings being a lot more speed than substance.

What a laugh that book was, IIRC he was constantly saying that he was over Metallica and James, first words in the book....JAMES HETFIELD :pac::pac:

briany

scudzilla wrote: »

What a laugh that book was, IIRC he was constantly saying that he was over Metallica and James, first words in the book....JAMES HETFIELD :pac::pac:

At any point in the book does he say, "....needless to say I had the last laugh."?

Say Your Number

scudzilla wrote: »

What a laugh that book was, IIRC he was constantly saying that he was over Metallica and James, first words in the book....JAMES HETFIELD :pac::pac:

The context being Hetfield once told him he was very lucky, Metallica don't get mentioned again for the next 50 odd pages and after he's kicked out there is only passing references to Metallica.

He does tell a story towards the end where he's writing music for a film and is told "it needs to sound like this" and they play him some Metallica and he thought it was hilarious, 20 years ago he probably would have trashed the place.

I thought it was a very enjoyable book, he does come across as a bit of an arsehole but he's a very interesting character.

briany

Bob Rock's on the latest episode of the Talk is Jericho podcast, if anyone's interested. Talks a good bit about his time producing Metallica, as well as a bit on Crue and Bon Jovi.

Ash.J.Williams

briany wrote: »

Bob Rock's on the latest episode of the Talk is Jericho podcast, if anyone's interested. Talks a good bit about his time producing Metallica, as well as a bit on Crue and Bon Jovi.

Cheers ..listening to it now because I remember Chris Jericho was one of the meatheads that smashed up his metallica collection when they cut their hair!

briany

Ash.J.Williams wrote: »

Cheers ..listening to it now because I remember Chris Jericho was one of the meatheads that smashed up his metallica collection when they cut their hair!

Well, he kept that anecdote quiet when he spoke to Bob about Load, anyway. Not that it would make much difference to Bob either way.

RTA2014

briany wrote: »

Bob Rock's on the latest episode of the Talk is Jericho podcast, if anyone's interested. Talks a good bit about his time producing Metallica, as well as a bit on Crue and Bon Jovi.

Getting rid of Bob Rock is the best thing metallica have done, if you listen to their shows now they Are fast and electric with that justice feel to them. Bob would never have approved of lords of summer,"it's too fast lads, make it like load". Thank fcuk that knob jockey is gone. He knew how to commercialise metallica, and that's what he did.

Sure look they're now playing Dyres eve, first time played in 2004, only played 31 times ever. They are going back to the fast stuff ( I hope)

jack presley

RTA2014 wrote: »

Thank fcuk that knob jockey is gone. He knew how to commercialise metallica, and that's what he did.

You've got to remember that they chose him because they wanted to be commercialised. He did exactly what Metallica wanted him to do.

RTA2014

jack presley wrote: »

You've got to remember that they chose him because they wanted to be commercialised. He did exactly what Metallica wanted him to do.

Their management did after they made a balls of justice, that's documented in "not so many words" in the black album documentary.

briany

This whole mindset is really bizarre. Why would anyone be annoyed that Metallica made a record so good that it sold millions of copies? Shouldn't that be a laudable accomplishment? Crab in a bucket mentality that's prevalent in metal. "You can be successful, but not so successful that any mainstream groups of people like any of your songs."

Their management may have suggested Rock but that's their job (one of them) to suggest options, but that Metallica didn't want to work with Rock or were forced to by their management is a total fallacy because the project would never have lasted and that would not have been any kind of good working environment. The relationship with Rock was strained by the end of production but only because he pushed and challenged their musical choices and got them to work in ways they weren't previously accustomed to.

Tony EH

Heavy metal music, at least the more extreme forms, has a certain iconoclastic nature to it. It's supposed to be about rejecting options you find objectionable to a large degree. This, of course, hinges on the listener being of a certain age and "discovering" that type of music in a sea of, what they would consider, drivel and most fans come to this type of music early in life. It's generally not something they latch onto in their 30's.

It's very difficult now to express what it was like in the 80's when thrash metal appeared. Like a lot of art forms, a given genre is birthed with an extension or revolt against what came before it. So, like Dada rejected what came before it and was extended by Surrealism, thrash rejected the staleness of "heavy rock", but was an extension of heavy metal/punk. Sure, one could say it's all just music and it is. But, when you're 16 that doesn't apply.

To me, the thrash metal scene was the last great scene to reach a huge audience entirely on its own steam, through tape trading and the listener taking chances on bands. It made absolute sense to the people that listened to it and it allowed for a lot of offshoots to be explored. But, the important thing is, is that it appeared without the dubious help of major record companies, who by and large, rejected the music outright until they cottoned on in the late 80's that their were a lot of people actually listening to it. Such a thing was always fine with metal fans. They were very happy with "their" bands being on small indie labels that wouldn't interfere with the bands and how they wanted to make their music and all was rosy in the garden.

One of the cornerstones of the thrash metal scene was Metallica, who were pioneers. The big two (Metallica and Slayer), subdivided from the "big four" (Metallica, Anthrax, Megadeth and Slayer), were the ambassadors of thrash metal in the 80's. It was those bands that inspired a generation to pick up an instrument and try to copy and better what they had laid down, just as they had copied and bettered what came before them.

But they did it without the want of radio play or chart position and their fans didn't want to see them on America's Top 40 or Top of the Pops either. It may be "crab in a bucket", but that's the way the genre had set out its stall in many ways and that's the way the fans, specifically, wanted it.

So, when one of those cornerstones of a musical type that seduced you in your youth start desiring to appear on Top of the Pops and goes looking for radio play, it inevitably leaves a bad taste in the mouth of the (former) fan and casts the band themselves in a lesser light to some.

Metallica's open desire for radio play and big time commerciality in general struck a lot of their fans in a bad way. But such things have always followed them. There were some people that thought 'Ride the Lightning' was a "sell out" and that will always happen. But, there is a huge difference between that and the deliberate effort to achieve mass market appeal that the 'Black' album (and their working with Bob Rock) represents to a lot of people. With that record, Metallica declared that that was the direction they desired and it inevitably turned people against them, while at the same time appealing to huge number of new fans, a lot of whom would have turned their nose up at the likes of 'Master of Puppets' or 'Ride the Lightning'. The writing was on the wall of course with '...And Justice for all' and its singles, but the 'Black' album was Metallica's effort to "forget" their past and head off down a different road. A road on which many of their listeners didn't want to go down. To me, 'Enter Sandman' was the T junction where Metallica went left and I went right. I occasionally see them driving along adjoining roads, but I can't wait for my turn off to come along.

At the end of the day though, it's all just tunes, as Cardiacs front man, Tim Smith would say and he's right. But, it's inevitable that some tunes people will find appealing and others they will find appalling.

I've often wondered what Cliff Burton would have made of it all.

Say Your Number

Cliff was listening to the likes of Kate Bush and REM, I think he even said in an interview right before he died he could see the band take a more melodic direction in the future.

I think if they came out with Justice pt.2 they would have just re-hashed what they did before and it probably wouldn't have been as good anyway, Sad But True and The Unforgiven are easily two of the best songs they've ever recorded.

Megadeth arguably also "sold out" with Countdown... but strangely they didn't get anywhere near the same amount of heat for it.