Today's Apocalypse Sign: Metallica Convert

To continue with the thread of a previous post (for the letter C), my musical metamorphosis continued beyond the grunge and alt/rock to a kind of "back to the future" thing. I am speaking of course about my assimilation into the Mighty Metallica! Even the Borg could not resist them.

Metallica has been around for over 30 years. Hard to believe, right?

Metallica has become one of the most influential heavy metal bands of all time, and is credited as one of the "big four" of thrash metal, along with Slayer, Anthrax, and Megadeth.^[1] The band has sold more than 100 million albums worldwide,^[132] including 59 million in the United States.^{[ (Wikipedia)}

I knew of their music in the 80's but listening to one of their songs was more by accident than purpose. If I had to guess I would say that For Whom The Bell Tolls was probably the first song of theirs I remember hearing. (In the interest of full (or semi-conscious) disclosure, the 80's were in fact quite a blur to me.) Since disco was officially dead then (was it ever really alive, or staying alive?), punk was just a little too out there (except for the Ramones), I consider the 80's mostly a music "lull". Thrash Metal was the order of the day for the hard core rockers. I was still mostly cruising with the classic rock.

Then in 1995 while firmly mired in the grunge/alt rock phase of my musically broadened horizon, I turn on the radio one day and hear this:

Metallica - Fuel         (Fuel lyrics - read first)


Holy shit! I was blown away by the raw energy of this song. I had goosebumps and my heart was pounding. You CAN NOT keep your feet still when you listen to it. I listened at warp 10 every time it came on the air. I bought the CD the next day and loved every song on it. In the last half of the 90's I would go to the NHRA Spring and Fall nationals in Ennis,Texas and this song played over and over again on my car CD player...all the way there and back. Here's a dare for you: I dare you to put this song on in your car and crank up the volume...and try and keep it under 90 mph no matter what road you are on. Can't do it.

My actual favorite song on the album after I had taken them all in (several times) was this one:

Metallica - Until It Sleeps (1996 winner Best Metal Video)


Haunting in its lyrics and almost classical (instrumentally) in some parts of the song. A man fighting his inner demons has never been more primal and dare I say, beautifully done.

After Load came out (no pun intended but if you want to know how the cover art came about read the Wiki link), in rapid succession there was Reload, another fantastic album, S&M (with the San Francisco Symphony)....and Garage Inc. which in some ways is kind of my favorite. Metallica's rendition of Whiskey In The Jar is a great sing along. By then I was also into a lot of their older and very popular music. My assimilation was complete.

The accomplishments of Metallica are too numerous to go into in this post. I include the Wiki Link that will make for interesting reading no matter whether you are a fan, a convert, curious, or oddly enough, not even a fan of the genre. 

There is no disputing some facts:

1. The band has won 9 Grammy awards.

2. Metallica had 5 consecutive albums debut at #1 on the Billboard 200 (first to ever do this).

3. Their 1991 album Metallica (known as the Black album) sold 25 million copies world wide.

4. They have sold over 100 million albums worldwide.

5. They are the fourth best selling music artist since Soundscan began tracking sales in 199,1 selling over 52 million albums(in the US alone) from 1991 to 2009.

6. Metallica wrote the song Unforgiven for the movie of the same name starring Clint Eastwood, Morgan Freeman, and Gene Hackman...as well as the song I Disappear for the Mission Impossible II soundtrack.

7. Lars Ulrich (drummer and band co-founder) spearheaded the legal battle against Napster for peer-to-peer sharing of copyrighted music. And succeeded in getting them to cease their web operation.

There are some great HD videos of a HUGE concert they did in Mexico City...just so you know they like more than Mariachi music south of the border. I have included a page of these at the top of this site for your review (when you have time). It is nothing but raw energy!


And the lyrics of this song (all of them) were in my wedding vows...



Stunning performance.

Wiki fun factoid that I remember:

In 1989, Metallica received its first Grammy Award nomination for ...And Justice for All, in the new Best Hard Rock/Metal Performance Vocal or Instrument category. Metallica was the favorite to win; however, the award was given to Jethro Tull for the album Crest of a Knave.^[36] The result generated controversy among fans and the press, as Metallica was standing off-stage waiting to receive the award after performing the song "One". Jethro Tull had been advised by its manager not to attend the ceremony as he was expecting Metallica to win.^[36] The award was named in Entertainment Weekly's "Grammy's 10 Biggest Upsets".^{[37]Wikipedia}

Rock out and enjoy!
^{Onward to the N zone....}