FREE ESSAY ON METALLICA

METALLICA

Metallica has not always been the talented group of rock musicians that they are today. It
took many years and many albums to bring the band to its current standing as the "kings
of rock." Metallica has undergone changes in its lineup and its musical writing style.
Comparing and contrasting the musical and lyrical content of each Metallica album shows
exactly how much they have changed from the early 1980s to 2000.
Metallica was founded in the early 1980s when a young man from Denmark named Lars Ulrich
was looking to start a band in the Los Angeles area. The musical style labeled "The New
Wave of British Heavy Metal" captivated Lars. The New Wave of British Heavy Metal started
in England in late 70s and was a product of some people's distaste for the current punk
rock scene (Crocker 11-12). Lars, who had recently moved to the United States, started
searching excessively for someone to jam with. He came across the name of a local heavy
metal guitarist and vocalist in a local newspaper called The Recycler. This man was named
James Hetfield. The two quickly became friends and began to play their favorite heavy
metal music together on a regular basis (Hadland, Encyclopedia Metallica).
The story behind the name Metallica is very interesting. A friend of Lars' was starting a
heavy metal fanzine and asked Lars for advice on what its title should be. The friend
gave Lars a list of candidate names and the word Metallica was on the list. Lars liked it
so much he told his friend to choose another name and kept Metallica for himself (Crocker
25-26). In 1983, the band's lineup came to consist of James on vocals and rhythm guitar,
Lars on percussion, Cliff Burton on bass guitar, and Kirk Hammett on lead guitar.
However, in 1986, while the band was several albums into their career, Cliff Burton was
tragically killed in a bus accident while the band was on tour in Sweden. Jason Newsted
of the band Flotsam and Jetsam immediately replaced Cliff after his death (Doughton,
73).
Metallica's heavy roots are traced back to their 1983 debut album Kill 'Em All. This
album is considered by most the very first thrash metal album ever. According to Alan
Gilkeson from the website about.com, thrash metal is "...basically derived from the
Hardcore Punk cross over of the late 70's and early 80's, this style was of course
brought to notoriety by the one and only Metallica." The band's main early influences
include Motorhead, Diamond Head, and Judas Priest (Crocker, 24). Taking these influences
and mixing them with their own writing style, Metallica invented thrash metal. Although a
new style of music was spawned from this album, it was not technically advanced. The
music mainly consisted of a lot of double picking on the guitar and fast double bass drum
beats (Doughton, 25-26). The lyrical content of Kill 'Em All is not particularly
profound. There are several examples of this on the album. The track Seek and Destroy is
basically about a group of people looking to start an unsubstantiated fight, and the song
entitled Motorbreath talks about fast cars and fast living (Hadland, Encyclopedia
Metallica). Ultimately, Kill 'Em All, while being simplistic in musical and lyrical
content, it has come to be one of the most influential metal albums of all time.
Metallica's sophomore release, Ride the Lightning, was a big step forward for the band
musically and lyrically. Ride the Lightning was definitely the most maturing the band did
from one album to the next. Cliff Burton played an enormous role in the band's evolution
on this album. In Burton's earlier years, he had been trained in classical music and he
brought his acquired knowledge to the band (Doughton, 48). The band's newfound classical
influence is recognized most strongly in a few select tracks on Ride the Lightning. Fade
to Black and The Call of Ktulu are two such tracks. Fade to Black shows off a classical
guitar solo in the beginning of the song and also contains a classical guitar interlude.
The Call of Ktulu, an instrumental song that is over eight minutes in length, is heavily
influenced by classical music. The song contains many changes in mood and tempo, showing
the bands' ability to incorporate dynamics into their music. Even though The Call of
Ktulu is an instrumental song, it was inspired by the writings of H.P. Lovecraft. The
Call of Cthulhu was a poem written by Lovecraft about a mystical creature. The spelling
of Cthulhu was changed to K-t-u-l-u to avoid copyright infringement (Hadland,
Encyclopedia Metallica). The lyrical content of Ride the Lightning matured alongside the
bands musical style. On this album, the band touched on such topics as suicide, nuclear
warfare, and capital punishment. The lyrics of the song Fade to Black are written from
the point of view of a person that is contemplating suicide. This song was inspired by
the theft of the bands' equipment while they were on tour in Boston (Hadland,
Encyclopedia Metallica). All in all, Ride the Lightning showed the most maturing in the
band's writing styles. In the magazine Creem Metal, Lars said the following about the
album: "We like playing fast, we like playing slow, we like being melodic once in a
while, we like being unmelodic, we like to throw a little bit of intelligence in there"
(Crocker, 75).
The band's third record, Master of Puppets, continued in the vein of Ride the Lightning
in that the songs had a somewhat classical feel to them and the lyrics were more mature
than they had been in the past. However, there is not nearly as much thrash metal
contained on this album as there was on Ride the Lightning. The album's opening track,
Battery, begins with a guitar solo that shows a very strong classical influence. The
songs Master of Puppets and Orion also incorporate classical elements into their
structures. The album has an overall lyrical theme of personal or political manipulation.
In the album's title track, the lyrics deal with the addictiveness and controlling nature
of drugs (Crocker, 77-79). The song expresses that a person addicted to drugs becomes a
"puppet" being controlled by their habit. Leper Messiah tells the story of a crooked
preacher manipulating his followers into donating their money to him for his own personal
gain (Crocker, 77). Master of Puppets was Metallica's first album that was truly
recognized by mainstream critics (Crocker, 80).
...And Justice for All also shows a great deal of maturing in Metallica's writing style.
According to Crocker in his book The Frayed Ends of Metal, ...And Justice for All marks
the first time Metallica incorporated many riffs into each song structure as opposed to
building a song around two or three essential riffs (125). ...And Justice for All and One
show off this newly acquired style of writing with many riffs and many dynamics. The song
One ties the music and the lyrical content together. It tells the story of a soldier who
lost his limbs and senses in battle. The song starts peacefully with a slow, acoustic
guitar, suggesting "...the peace of the dead..." and then transforms into an angry rush
of guitar and drum riffs. (Crocker, 128). The lyrics from ...And Justice for All are
heavily influenced by politics and current world affairs. For example, the opening track
on the album, Blackened, gives a bleak image of what the world could look like if its
inhabitants were not cautious with the use of nuclear warfare. The title track, ...And
Justice for All, discusses the band's views on the current state of the United States
government. This song states that only a select few have power and that those select few
are generally corrupt Hadland, Encyclopedia Metallica). Clearly, Metallica went in a
different direction with ...And Justice for All. Song structures were much more complex
with more changes and an increased number of riffs.
Metallica's self-titled album, commonly known as The Black Album, is widely regarded by
the mainstream as their biggest change. Many people charged Metallica with "selling out"
by releasing this album for many reasons. First, the album seems to be geared toward a
more mainstream audience having shorter song times and a greater number of songs. The
album also sounds very produced. The song structures are very tight, using a few core
riffs for each song. In addition to those factors, this was the first album Metallica
included a ballad, complete with a symphony orchestra accompanying the band (Doughton,
132-136). Lyrically, this album is also a lot different than what they have done before.
The lyrics are much more personal. The song The God That Failed touches on the subject of
the death of Hetfield's mother. She was a Christian Scientist and died as a result of her
refusal of medial treatment. The album's ballad, Nothing Else Matters, is about love over
long distances and how love holds no physical bounds (Hadland, Encyclopedia Metallica). 
Load and Reload were recorded during the same sessions and therefore are considered the
same album. Again, these albums showed a lot of maturing for the band. The songs
contained on Load and Reload have more of a raw, laid-back, rock-n-roll feel to them, as
opposed to the harsh heavy metal sound. For example, the track Mama Said, surprisingly
enough, even incorporates strong country music elements into its structure (Hadland,
Encyclopedia Metallica).
Finally, in 1999, Metallica released a live album entitled S&M. This album was recorded
with a full symphony orchestra and the band performed songs from throughout their entire
career along with two new tracks. The fact that Metallica, a heavy metal band, played an
entire set with a symphony shows their willingness to try new things. 
Metallica did not have much variety incorporated into their music when they formed as a
thrash metal band in the early 1980s. However, after dissecting each one of Metallica's
albums throughout the years, it is clear to see that the band has greatly matured
musically and lyrically.