Ace Audio: "Moth Into Flame" - Metallica

As much as I hate to say it, Metallica has not been doing well at all in the modern era. Fans have been thrashing (No pun intended) albums since Ride the Lightning, but after ...And Justice For All, it seems that very few fans are ever being pleased. Sure they released some good stuff here and there but many fans were flat out displeased with Load, Reload, and St. Anger and plenty of other things have not been very good on the band. After the entire Napster debate that killed off a good chunk of the band's fan base, it seemed like Metallica was doing nothing but going down hill. To give you some perspective, in 2013 Metallica released a movie called "Into the Never" which costed around $32 Million dollars to make, and it flopped hard, making back only $7 Million at the box office, despite good critical reception. What I'm saying is that Metallica was on a downhill, and whether you like St. Anger or not, we can agree it is nowhere near the quality of Metallica's older stuff like "Master of Puppets", "For Whom the Bell Tolls" and "One".

I say this because Metallica decided to release another album, and they have already released a few singles from it, the first one was alright, nothing to amazing, but good. This one is however a much better sounding song.

The opening instrumentals definitely have a Metallica sound to them sounding like "Master of Puppets" but I think that the similar sound is very welcomed here. Really the song just sounds like the Metallica many fans wanted during St. Anger, and I feel like this song can easily fit alongside "Master of Puppets" and "Battery".

I also got to say, the instrumentals are awesome, especially that guitar solo. Hot damn I haven't heard a good guitar solo from Metallica in a while, and James Hetfield's vocals still have the power of the older days.

This is the newest release from their upcoming album, and if the rest of the album has awesome songs like this, I really think Metallica is going in the right direction. I do think this is also better than the previous released track "Hardwired" which to me sounded a bit more like Megadeth. After almost a decade of displeasing fans, Metallica could have and quite honestly should have thrown in the towel after "Through the Never", but they kept pushing and this is the kind of stuff you can get if you keep pushing. I have high hopes for the album when it comes out, I may not get it on release, but I will get it eventually.

Sorry this review came off a bit short, but I really wanted to talk about this song. I wanted to talk about how Metallica are heading in the right direction. Because this song is so recent, I really didn't have a whole lot to say about it, and this also took the place of another review that I was planning on doing. Considering my last Ace Audio, this is kind of fitting as well, and honestly, I think now I can forgive "St. Anger".

I'm the Entity of Darkness, and keep moving, whether it is forward, backward or sideways, just keep moving.

Auditory Abominations: "St. Anger" - Metallica

With my previous posts, I've been complaining about general pop music. Sure Pop music has some of my least favourite songs of any genre, but that isn't the entirety of it, so for this and the next two posts, I'm going to look at the worst that my favourite genre has to offer.

I don't think I really stated that I love Heavy Metal before, it is really a combination of the instrumentals and the lyrics. Often the lyrics are deep and have some meanings and the instrumentals have power and skill behind them and aren't just some faceless person on a keyboard making the rhythm. My dislike towards a lot of Pop Music, is not spawned from my love of Metal, but I won't say that it is helped by it either.

Now we are looking at one of the worst metal songs of all time, and I got to say, there is good reason for it to be called that. You can hear the problems of all the song at the beginning. Actually, you can hear every problem this song has at the start, such as Lars Ulrich's obnoxious use of cymbals and snares and how poorly structured the song is.

I'll get to the first problem later, but I really want to talk about the song's structure and flow. If you want to know how bad it is, the verses are usually fast paced with James Hetfield's raspy singing voice, the chorus does not sound like that at all, it is slow and calm, which does not seem to be the tone the song is going for since the lyrics describe a suicide and the music video takes place in a prison.

Also, while I'm on the subject, the lyrics don't do this song any favours either. If the repeat of the words "Flush it out" don't annoy you, I think you'll enjoy this song. Also "I'm Madly in Anger with you"? What does that even mean? It's like a whiny teenage emo kid wrote this song about his first break-up, which I doubt is the theme of this song.

Really, the song gives me nothing to grab on to. Like when I look at some of the best metal songs of all-time there is a meaning I can grab, such as System of a Down's "BYOB", talking about the middle eastern war, or Sabaton's "To Hell and Back", which focuses on the damaging effects of war on the people who fight it, or Metallica's "Master of Puppets" which is about drug abuse and how damaging it can be to one's psyche. I have no idea what this song is about, nor what it is even possibly about.

And yes, Lars' drumming is the worst part of this song. It sounds like he is drumming on kitchen pots and pot lids. It's even worse because I'm fairly certain that the drumming is above the actual music, so I can't tell if the guitar or bass work is actually solid or anything.

With some rewriting, and more bass drums than snares, I think this could be a decent track, not one of Metallica's best, but better than the song we actually got. It's a shame when a good band like Metallica gives us a song that feels rushed and broken. It's the equivalent of a jackhammer pounding in your ears. I'll give Chicago this, at least they didn't give me a headache like this song did.

But thankfully, no other amazing group as popular and long lasting as Metallica has given us anything worth calling an Auditory Abomination... well, except for maybe Megadeth.

I'm the Entity of Darkness, and yes, next time will be a Megadeth song.