What are you listening to right now?

And if you don't give in, and don't give up, you just might be okay.



songs, it was along the lines of lazily throwing songs together and ending up with “Load and Reload”.
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Yeah, I remember that as well. Was on some kind of music show, the term "Load" is supposed to be synonymous with a four letter word for fertilizer. So, if "Load" was a bunch of fertilizer or perhaps a patty or apple of some kind thrown together to make "Load," when it was time to make "Reload" it was more of same.

So, I've never heard a Metallica album all the way through. Some of their songs hit really well at certain times, the better the stereo the better, I know a band member is Lars Ulrich, I know the lead singer looks like Lawrence from Office Space, "I'll tell ya what I'd do man.." that guy. Metallica was key in shutting down Napster when that was still a thing, and they have some good music. No I don't like it all.
 
HemiBenny said:
I agree with your take on St. Anger. I remember watching “Some kind of monster” and it documented a lot of the problems that they were dealing with leading up to that album. I even remember a remark that James Hetfield made while they were trying to hash out some songs, it was along the lines of lazily throwing songs together and ending up with “Load and Reload”. While I can’t remember exactly what he said, it was basically a dig at those two albums.
St. Anger is the result of all of that and it is by far their worst sounding album. “Recorded in an industrial freezer”, that’s a great way to put it. I could get better sounding drum tracks by banging on my dining room table.
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Hmmm, I may have seen a different interview on that. I remember James saying that with Load that Kirk and Lars were really keen on some very different sounding material and he wasn't totally into the idea, but was cool with them putting it together anyways and seeing how it sounded. Turns out, it was pretty good, but that's the reason the album was so varied. They had a lot of it, and that's why it was followed by Reload. They even did that country track, Mama Said. What seemed to really rub James the wrong way was the optics; the image that Kirk and Lars were running with, which he felt didn't properly represent the band. I think the music itself was mostly OK, they've had plenty of less heavy tracks, including ones he's written, like Nothing else Matters, in the past. It was the artistic "flair" and the look that Kirk and Lars were curating that for him, wasn't Metallica.

Some of this is covered in this Wired interview:
https://blabbermouth.net/news/james...percent-into-load-and-reload-era-of-metallica

More of it here in this Ultimate Guitar interview:
Metallica frontman James Hetfield distanced himself from the band's '90s image during "Load" era, saying he was never particularly fond of several aspects regarding that period.

He tells journalist Dan Nykolayko: "Honestly, that was a time in my life where I was just backing off a little bit.

"I was trying to let things happen and I backed off quite a bit. Obviously the art and the photo shoot and the cover, for sure. I was tired of fighting. So I just kinda let it happen. That's Lars and Kirk definitely running with Metallica right there, and that's what it ended up as."

Focusing on the logo change, James added: "That was another thing that I was not into, but tried to make the best of, you know? It just seemed like everyone wanted it to be a little more slick, a little more simple... easy to fit on posters or whatever, and that's what came up."

Admitting that loads of backlash the record caused caught him by surprise, drummer Lars Ulrich added: "The whole thing with the haircuts and all that was obviously nonsense because you know, Jason cut his hair on the 'Black Album' tour. I remember when he showed up in my hotel room in New York when we were on the road in '93.

"But it was all that stuff that just kind of morphed into what it became, and I mean we talked about that a thousand times but we didn't want to be boxed in and we didn't want to be repeating what we did. And with this stuff, like it was on the 'Black Album,' we wanted it to be abstract.

"Let it be mysterious. Let people do with it what they want. We felt so free. It had been five years and there was this whole thing about feeling, you know. It was like the success of the 'Black Album' had afforded us, not necessary financially, but it just afforded us - not necessarily like '**** you' but it was just like we can go here, we can go there, we can go here. We can do this. It was about the possibilities. Do you know what I mean? And that was kind of fun."

Focusing on the backlash once again, Lars added: "The whole thing, to my recollection, was literally about the haircuts. And then I just remember hearing myself say like 5,000 times, 'Jason cut his hair in '93.' It wasn't like we called up like the local San Rafael barbershop. 'Can we get a four for one, please? You know, in and out in an hour, four guys, 15 minutes each.' I remember that became one of the standard answers in the press tours. You're in the 23rd German interview of the day and they ask, 'Why did you all get haircuts at the same time?"
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I also recall the reason St. Anger sounded so bad was that they had tried to go a completely different direction again; more "thrashy", and they went with a totally different, totally digital recording setup. It was awful. The drums sound worse than a 96kbps MP3, lol.
 
schwinney said:
Yeah, I remember that as well. Was on some kind of music show, the term "Load" is supposed to be synonymous with a four letter word for fertilizer. So, if "Load" was a bunch of fertilizer or perhaps a patty or apple of some kind thrown together to make "Load," when it was time to make "Reload" it was more of same.
Click to expand...
The cover of Load was literally semen and blood. And you'll note that Load, in that context (minus the blood) isn't an uncommon use of the word. Lars was HUGE into art at the time, and those are his favourite album covers.

These are both a bit of an artistic tangent taken by Lars and Kirk and James went along for the ride. Both Kirk and Lars were very pleased with the material, they most certainly would not describe it as fertilizer. It was also extremely well produced.
schwinney said:
So, I've never heard a Metallica album all the way through. Some of their songs hit really well at certain times, the better the stereo the better, I know a band member is Lars Ulrich, I know the lead singer looks like Lawrence from Office Space, "I'll tell ya what I'd do man.." that guy. Metallica was key in shutting down Napster when that was still a thing, and they have some good music. No I don't like it all.
Click to expand...
Napster was going to get shutdown anyways, but they should not have mired themselves in that controversy, it definitely didn't do good things for the band's image. I'm surprised you've never heard the whole black album, I'd figure everybody has.
 
OVERKILL said:
Hmmm, I may have seen a different interview on that. I remember James saying that with Load that Kirk and Lars were really keen on some very different sounding material and he wasn't totally into the idea, but was cool with them putting it together anyways and seeing how it sounded. Turns out, it was pretty good, but that's the reason the album was so varied. They had a lot of it, and that's why it was followed by Reload. They even did that country track, Mama Said. What seemed to really rub James the wrong way was the optics; the image that Kirk and Lars were running with, which he felt didn't properly represent the band. I think the music itself was mostly OK, they've had plenty of less heavy tracks, including ones he's written, like Nothing else Matters, in the past. It was the artistic "flair" and the look that Kirk and Lars were curating that for him, wasn't Metallica.

Some of this is covered in this Wired interview:
https://blabbermouth.net/news/james...percent-into-load-and-reload-era-of-metallica

More of it here in this Ultimate Guitar interview:


I also recall the reason St. Anger sounded so bad was that they had tried to go a completely different direction again; more "thrashy", and they went with a totally different, totally digital recording setup. It was awful. The drums sound worse than a 96kbps MP3, lol.
Click to expand...
It may have been Lars or Kirk that made the remark, but I thought that it was James that made it, I may be wrong. It has been a very long time since I watched it. I remember they were all in the room, basically arguing about things and it came down to someone saying something about just throwing things together and that you end up with, ”load”.
I’ll have to pull that up and see, it’s been so long.
 
Here’s a great video of The Police with the beginning consisting of the album version and the middle consisting of a live recording and then back to the album version at the end. I remember having a VHS copy of “The Police-Around the world” back in the 80’s.
Poor Andy being 10 years older than Stewart and Sting must have felt like a parent trying to control two fighting children at times. 😂
 
OVERKILL said:
The cover of Load was literally semen and blood. And you'll note that Load, in that context (minus the blood) isn't an uncommon use of the word. Lars was HUGE into art at the time, and those are his favourite album covers.

These are both a bit of an artistic tangent taken by Lars and Kirk and James went along for the ride. Both Kirk and Lars were very pleased with the material, they most certainly would not describe it as fertilizer. It was also extremely well produced.

Napster was going to get shutdown anyways, but they should not have mired themselves in that controversy, it definitely didn't do good things for the band's image. I'm surprised you've never heard the whole black album, I'd figure everybody has.
Click to expand...

I just did a quickie check and I always thought that was a flame or flame front or some surface of the sun or an embryonic sack. Oh my. Yes, in that context, half of it is a "Load" 🤣🤣i] was released very soon before I turned 14 and when I was still in choir. Reload a little after 15, since it was released about a year 5 months and little more than 2 weeks later.. Fuel ("Give me fuel give me fire give me couldneverunderstandwhatcamenext") was the first track on Reload, did not know it came out that late. I definitely like early Metallica better. Grand rock masterpieces like Meatloaf mixed with Light Pantera. Or heavy GN'R. And yes it's Give me fuel give me fire give me that which I desire. 1997 was a different time.. and Google did not exist in its present form, I don't think. Most things didn't.. we can all become instant historians now, thanks to Google. Imagine my shock when I learned that Mountain Dew does not limit sperm count, as I was told as a teen. Heartbreak. So yeah I may have been repeating what I was told by teachers who want to be cool by mish-moshing what was said by various band members at different times about those two albums. You'll always be a bigger Metallica fan than I.

I could totally see something like this, The Call of Ktulu, just left on if I ever want something to listen to on long trips where I do not want to listen to something yet also not nothing. They have a REALLY GOOD library but I don't think I can listen to them daily. When I'm going through something? Yeah. When it's in the moment? Yup!



"Moth into the flame" I like. Sounds like their old self.



Fuel: (he clearly trying to be all intense in the video. I listen to the songs. I don't watch the videos.)



Listening to that on my walk.
 
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