Artist: Metallica
Label: Castle Communications
Released: 2006
These days Metallica inspire others who will never reach them, let alone surpass them. But what inspired Metallica in their early years, and what still inspires them today? And which of the legends did they match and surpass?!
Metallica is one of those bands that have turned heads through every year of a rich, 25-year career. At the height of the glam metal boom, they decided to play thrash metal. They wanted to name their debut ‘Metal Up Your Ass!?’, but bowed to the label’s demands and called the record the “friendlier” ‘Kill ’em All’. Then they kicked out the problematic guitarist Dave Mustaine and, with the next two records, laid the foundations of heavy metal. Tragedy followed – bassist Cliff Burton dies in a road accident on tour and Jason Newsted joins the band. In this period they record the first “problematic” album of their career – ‘…And Justice For All’, their first video for ‘One’, and for the first time they turn to cleaning out the garage. A kind of homage to their heroes! Let’s face it – Metallica sounded great! Then came another “sellout” with the album ‘Metallica’, grueling tours, an image makeover and a change of musical style – ‘Load’ and ‘Reload’ are still not popular records today, even though Metallica proved themselves a brilliant band that didn’t stay blindly pinned down inside some genre box. And then two compilations arrived in quick succession – on ‘S&M’ they played a hefty bouquet of hits with a symphony orchestra, and on ‘Garage Inc.’ they gathered the songs from the ‘Garage Days’ EPs and, as a bonus, recorded a whole album of new, interesting material – covers, of course. And so we don’t have to wrestle with what’s been going on in the band lately (a bassist change, James Hetfield’s rehab, the band almost breaking up, the cleansing record ‘St. Anger’, the documentary about the hell inside the band ‘Some Kind Of Monster’, the 20th anniversary and the ‘Master Of Puppets’ tour dedicated to it, a collection of videos and the impatient wait for a new record), let’s stop right here.
The records ‘Garage Inc.’ and ‘Full Metal Garage’ are very similar. The first gathers the songs that inspired, and still inspire, Metallica, in versions that are more or less close to the originals. How close they are to the originals, you can hear on the ‘Full Metal Garage’ compilation, although a few songs are missing – there’s no ‘Stone Cold Crazy’ by Queen, and not all the Motorhead songs are there either. And of course – even ‘Garage Inc.’ has absolutely nothing by Iron Maiden and nothing by AC/DC. About the latter, Kirk Hammett said, for example, that they didn’t want to do covers because all their songs are perfect already!
On the first record we thus find, among others, Diamond Head (‘It’s Electric’, joined on the second by ‘Helpless’ and the cult ‘Am I Evil?’, ‘The Prince’ and ‘Sucking my Love’), who, with their excellent guitar riff intros, transitions and solo parts, plus the general composition of their songs, are easily counted among the bands that helped shape Metallica’s sound. There’s absolutely no doubt that Black Sabbath (‘Sabbra Cadabra’) and Mercyful Fate (‘Curse of the Pharaohs’ and ‘Evil’) were among the most influential too, but after that you have to start thinking a little… The Misfits? The late Cliff Burton was a huge fan – the band’s cult status and very noisy, dirty sound (especially the bass), but too one-note for me to find enough interesting parallels… Metallica and Discharge can be linked for the ‘Kill ’em All’ era – rasping, noisy, just plain thrashy, but with outstanding riffs and virtuoso guitars. Nick Cave remains a mystery, even though his drama and unpredictability push past the limits of the normal; the acoustic Lynyrd Skynyrd, the otherwise extremely interesting Blue Oyster Cult, whose vocals kill the superb instrumental structure of the song, and Thin Lizzy also fall into the category of the unknown… great guitars, so-so vocals, but very full, though without any particular common ground.
On the second, besides the already mentioned Diamond Head, we can’t skip the intricately built ‘The Small Hours’ by Holocaust, the punchy riffs of the otherwise terribly sung ‘The Wait’ by Killing Joke, the hard-hitting and full ‘Blitzkrieg’ by Blitzkrieg (listening to the live version by Metallica is how my own acquaintance with Metallica began), the riff-driven ‘Breadfan’ by Budgie, where a woman sings, by the way, and with which Metallica opened their Ljubljana show, the playful ‘So What’ by Anti Nowhere League, the virtuoso and unbelievably faaaast ‘Killing Time’ by Sweet Savage, and the roaring Motorhead classics ‘Overkill’ and ‘Too late, too late’; the guitars in ‘Let it Loose’ and also ‘Dirty Money’ by Savage again remind us of ‘Kill ’em all’ and Metallica’s Burton era in general.
It’s clear that on ‘Garage Inc.’ too, the second record presented the songs (with the exception of the Motorhead covers, which were played in honor of Lemmy and his Abraham) and the bands that really had a direct influence on Metallica and their sound, while the first record already pointed to the fading of the then-current lineup and creative rifts within the band. To be honest, it also has to be admitted that Metallica played the vast majority of the songs better than the originals, but thanks to the development of both the band and studio technology, that’s not actually hard. And if we’re being honest – it’s always easier to cover something that’s already been created and that is by all means above average, or rather excellent.
For Metallica fans, the compilation probably won’t be anything special or interesting, since it gathers bands and songs that are an unavoidable part of the classics of the British and American waves of heavy metal, which of course are never missing from the collection of any sincere, die-hard metalhead. But for anyone who likes either Metallica or British / American heavy metal and doesn’t know where to start… a great buy!
Track List
CD1.:
1. Free Speech For The Dumb – Discharge
2. It’s Electric – Diamond Head
3. Sabbra Cadabra – Black Sabbath
4. Turn The Page – Seger, Bob
5. Die Die My Darling – Misfits (1)
6. Loverman – Cave, Nick
7. Curse Of The Pharoah’s – Mercyful Fate
8. Evil – Mercyful Fate
9. Astronomy – Blue Oyster Cult
10. Whiskey In The Jar – Blue Oyster Cult
11. Tuesday’s Gone – Lynyrd Skynyrd
12. More I See – Discharge
CD2.:
1. Helpless – Diamond Head
2. Small Hours – Holocaust
3. Wait – Killing Joke
4. Crash Course In Brain Surgery – Budgie
5. Am I Evil – Diamond Head
6. Blitzkreig – Blitzkrieg
7. Breadfan – Budgie
8. Prince – Diamond Head
9. So What – Anti-Nowhere League
10. Killing Time – Sweet Savage
11. Overkill – Motorhead
12. Too Late Too Late – Motorhead
13. Let It Loose – Savage (1)
14. Sucking My Love – Diamond Head
15. Dirty Money – Savage (1)
16. Stormchild – Jaguar (1)
