themusicaddict's Greatest Albums Of All-Time: Metallica's The Black Album

Hello,

This is the latest in my series of blogs about what in my opinion are the greatest CDs ever. Today is Metallica's self-titled album. It's also known as The Black Album, due to the dark black cover. The word "Metallica" and a coiled snake are hard to see against the black cover. This CD is 22 years old and it doesn't sound dated one bit, a definite all-time classic CD!

The Black album is Metallica's 5th CD, I wasn't a big fan of them before it was released. I can see why I wasn't a big Metallica fan when listening to their early music. Although their growth from their 1st CD to The Black Album is very clear. Thanks to my friends at Spotify I spent a lot of time listening to Metallica last night and this morning.

Metallica's first 4 CDs are "Kill Em All" (1983), this is clearly the work of a band that's finding both themselves and their sound. "Ride The Lightning" (1984) was better than their previous CD, but they were still maturing. Metallica's first fully mature CD is "Master of Puppets" (1986). Many hard core Metallica fans consider this CD Metallica's first classic. Metallica's 4th CD is "...And Justice For All" (1988), this CD set the framework for Metallica to explode into the big time when The Black Album was released 3 years later. The Black Album was released, on August 12th, 1991.

Because I had a bit of money in my pocket I ended up buying this CD and haven't looked back since. Without a doubt The Black Album is one of the greatest CDs ever. I saw Metallica in concert following the release of The Black Album and honestly I was disappointed. However I don't think that Metallica is one of those bands you can just latch on to. Since I was a recent convert to them, there was a lot I didn't understand. But that doesn't take anything away from the greatness of The Black Album.

The Black Album seems to be Metallica's peak. Five years later Metallica released the less than impressive "Load", the best song is probably the terribly named "Ain't My Bitch". Later they released the very mediocre "St. Anger".

I really wasn't interested in Metallica until the video for "One" started appearing on MTV. (That was back in the late 80's, back when MTV was still relevant and influential.) "One":



Awhile later I discovered the pleasures of another "...And Justice For All" track "Harvester of Sorrow". I remember reading a profile on a band in the 80's, I can't remember who the band was. All the band members used Metallica songs as nicknames for their girlfriends. One of the band member's nickname for his girlfriend was "Harvester of Sorrow":



Here's the complete album:



Here are the 12 songs individually from the Black album 1) "Enter Sandman":



2) "Sad But True":



3) "Holier Than Thou":



4) "The Unforgiven": I don't have an exact count but I think MTV showed this video 4,987,654 times.



5) "Wherever I May Roam":



6) "Don't Tread On Me":



7 songs into the 12 songs of this album and I keep on thinking to myself "Damn this is a good CD".  7) "Through The Never":



8) "Nothing Else Matters":



9) "Of Wolf and Man":



10) "The God That Failed":



11) "My Friend of Misery":



12) "The Struggle Within":



themusicaddict