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Is there anything Rick Rubin can’t do? It’s been a good 15 years since Metallica started losing it, five since St. Anger helped globally popularize the idea of its retirement. Even the band – down Jason Newsted and awaiting ex-Suicidal Tendencies bassist Robert Trujillo’s absorption into the group – admitted that its last album, tunelessly pieced together from studio jams and group-therapy notes, had no songs. Lars Ulrich’s drums didn’t sound like drums any more. The new tunes were ignored on tour and the band members performed facing in four different directions. It was all but done.
Getting Rubin to produce your record has become a total marketing gimmick, yes, sort of a shorthand suggestion to the public that this is the “comeback” album. Still, Rubin is the reigning studio master of career rehabilitation – not to mention the dude who helmed Slayer’s white-knuckled early recordings – and hiring him was, at least, an admission on Metallica’s part that it needed help. We are right to expect big things from the band’s 10th album, Death Magnetic (Warner, 
out of 4), which arrives in stores today.
We get them, too. Or, at least, we get exactly the throwback to the hungry thrash of Metallica’s early years that everyone pretty much expected from the moment Rubin came on board.
“That Was Just Your Life” chugs into life from a portentous, pulsing intro like a Metallica tune could, all blunt-force riffing, galloping rhythms and snarly Hetfield nonsense like “I want the world to die / Like a release from prison / That I didn’t know I was in.” The arrangement changes shape a few times, there’s a raging Kirk Hammett solo in the back half and, for the first time in years, there’s a chorus you’ll remember to shout along with next time.
“Welcome back,” one sighs, and is pleasantly surprised to find the same momentum sustained throughout most of Death Magnetic.
It’s a predictable exercise in a lot of ways and, like U2’s How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb or R.E.M.’s Accelerate, a tacit, backward-looking admission that the band’s best years are behind it. It sounds amazing, though – Rubin’s response to the limp drum production on St. Anger seems to have been to push everything into the red this time – and if you’re a longtime fan, it should bring a few smiles to your face before you dig “Blackened” out of the archives once again for a taste of how it should always be done. Ben Rayner,
September 13th, 2008 at 3:17 am
Yeyeye, it’s good. Altho they made some bad choices imo. They should’ve deleted Cyanide and the instrumental song. Cyanide just doesn’t fit the album AT ALL. And that instrumental one was just put on the to ‘prove’ that they were going oldschool again. It’s just not all that great “Missing link” between justice and black album? NEVER. This album undoubtably has some old school influences, but there’s also some Load in it, aswell as st anger, which doesn’t necessarily mean it’s bad, but you can’t deny this. I’m a big fan of Load, it’s great music, not great metal, but just damn good music. So, to sum it up: Death Magnetic is good, but it’s not nearly as good as i expected from the guys. Rick Rubin failed in my opinion.
September 13th, 2008 at 10:23 am
Rick Rubin doesn’t seem to have contributed anything more that telling them to “do it oldschool style” and tainting the legacy with a recording that has fallen victim to the “loudness war”. The low frequencies are high and the high frequencies are brick walled. There is no dynamic range. Great album with great songs but the sound quality is an issue. Hopefully this album will bring the problem of the loudness war to the public’s attention and we can get something done about it. This album needs re-mixed and re-mastered and somebody needs to kick Greg Fidelman in the nuts! He was also involved with RHCP’s Californication which also suffered badly from digital clipping of the waveform dur to the loudness wars.
September 14th, 2008 at 1:20 am
call me crazy…..but i think that death magnitic is an inspiring, 80 minute piece of brutal, no bullshit metal. from the opening heart beat to the very last note, you know and feel that the guys feel alive again. i think its a perfect fit with the first 4 awesome albums. there isnt a bad song on this album. great job metallica! great job rubin!
September 15th, 2008 at 1:57 pm
I have been a Metallica fan since day 1 and its been a long road especially the last part.When I heard the album I just wanted to call one of the boys and tell’em “Good to have ya back Lads”.Fuckin album rocks (its about time).Great job gents!!!
September 15th, 2008 at 2:10 pm
Hmm, i have to disagree here. It’s not a fit with the first 4 albums, not by a long shot. Look at what the hell Rubin did with Slipknot. Vol3 The Subliminal Verses was an awesome record, which totally outclasses this one. Rubin didn’t fulfill his role as resurrector of bands.
September 16th, 2008 at 1:17 pm
This album in my opinion completely brings Metallica back to the level of what they were 10+ years ago. This album kicks ass from start to end. I am listening to it as I type this. Sounds a lot like the old Metallica, fast and frenzied!!!! Great job boys and great job Rick, I can’t wait to see them in December when they come to the forum. This CD definitely took the bad taste of St. Anger away. DEATH MAGNETIC!!!!!
September 16th, 2008 at 1:45 pm
I actually have to say that I think death magnetic is way better than Vol. 3 from slipknot. It’s by far my least favorite of theirs including “all hope is gone”. Death Magnetic had me a little nervous before it’s release, but it was worth the wait.
September 16th, 2008 at 3:23 pm
I am actually overwhelmed at how great this album is. True that some of the sound mixing is a little off but other than that it kicks ass. In the old days, I was used to buying a new Metallica album and listening to it over and over again for like 6 months straight cause it was so awesome. Then St. Anger came out and I could only stand it for a month. Well, Metallica is back, with a vengence, in Death Magnetic. Its loud, fast, furious, and down right heavy! I can’t wait to see my boys in January at the Bradley for the 12th time. I hope they play at least 7 songs from the new album! Thanks, guys for making me proud that I have that “Binge and Purge” tat on my bicep again!
October 22nd, 2008 at 3:57 am
I was one of those guys who were yelling “sellouts” in regards to the black album. When Load came out, it was nothing more than something to make jokes about while drinking with buddies, and at that point I never wore a Metallica shirt again, which used to be pretty much my entire wardrobe. Noone I grew up with would even consider buying anything after the black Album.
Untill now.
This is the first MEtallica album I have purchased in over 13 years, and whatever negativity I said about them in the past, I fully take back now.
Death Magnetic is a fucking masterpiece!
Not only when compared to anything metallica has done in well over a decade, but also when compared to what any other metal band has done in well over a decade, this album kicks serious ass. The fast shredding riffage, combined with a certain catchyness not quite achieved by Metallica before makes these tunes a refreshing delight!
Sure, it’s no puppets, or lightning, or Justice, and the mixing could have been better, but looking past sound quality issues, which are the least of my concerns about Metallica’s music, and imagining what these tunes would sound like live … Damn, it does kicks ass!
Broken, Beat & Scarred = awesome
All Nightmare Long = Fuckin awesome ( Actually, during the first 3 minnutes of this song I had an ear to ear smile, and tears, actual fuckin tears, started to form in my eyes.)
Suicide & Redemption = awesome (contrary to someone else’s comment about how it’s a poor attempt at being “oldschool” or whatever? No man, that’s reading too much into it, it’s just an awesome song. I really, really like that fuckin song.)
This is the type of album that all Metallica fans should be investing into kick ass car stereo systems so they can drive around showing it off to the world!
Metallica IS back!
November 2nd, 2008 at 10:09 pm
awesome and magnificent.a toal come back of the fourhorsemen who popularized hard and heavy metal!!!
June 29th, 2010 at 1:33 am
Californication is great too and involves lots of sexy stuff in this tv series.;;,
July 12th, 2010 at 11:35 am
i love to watch Californication, all those pretty girls wowwww”*”