Track Listing

1. Fuel
2. The memory remains
3. Devil's dance
4. Unforgiven II
5. Better than you
6. Slither
7. Carpe diem baby
8. Bad seed
9. Where the wild things are
10. Prince Charming
11. Low man's lyric
12. Attitude
13. Fixxxer

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #6612 in Music
• Released on: 2007-07-02
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 76 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
For many heavy metal fans, Metallica epitomizes the genre, especially for those listeners who remember the band's fast-and-furious 1983 debut, Kill 'Em All. As a result, their continued foray into a more stripped-down, laid-back sound with this album has met a mixed response. However, there's enough innovation and just plain strange stuff on this album to make it worth a listen. The creepy "The Memory Remains" is perfectly accentuated by Marianne Faithfull's backing vocals, and "Where the Wild Things Are" features the multi-layered vocals and guitars that Metallica is famous for, albeit at about half their usual speed. The opening ("Fuel") and closing ("Fixxxer") tracks are especially strong, and intermixed with some slower, country-inflected tunes are the obnoxious rockers that made Metallica the long-running success they are. --Genevieve Williams

CD Description
When Metallica recorded 1996's LOAD, the studio sessions were fruitful enough for the band to put out two records. A year and a half later, RELOAD is the inevitable follow-up. Stretching beyond Metallica's speed metal roots, RELOAD is a continuation of the experimentation that dismayed many old fans and welcomed in many new ones. As a result, many Metallicafirsts are reached on their eighth album. Some anomalies include recruiting the legendary Marianne Faithfull to contribute backing vocals on "The Memory Remains" and the addition of hurdy-gurdy and violin to the mix of the wistful "Low Man's Lyric". Throughout all this experimentation, Metallica still plays hard and fast, particularly on the metal groove of"Fuel" and the relentless pounding of "Where The Wild Things Are", (a title borrowed from children's author Maurice Sendak). Metallica continues to reinvent itself in a genre where mediocrity is always just around the corner.

Customer Reviews

Good in parts
This album met with a huge amount of derision on it's release back in good old 1997 - seems like so long ago now. Looking back now, a lot of the criticism the record came in for was over the top. Most of it was based on the fact that Metallica had 'sold out'. This is surely nonsense as this record sold far less than those preceeding it. It would have been far safer for Metallica to have made another 'Black Album' - but the guys wanted to explore different musical influences. There are a lot of blues and 70s rock influences on this as compared to the speed metal of say 'Master of Puppets'. Some of it works, some of it doesn't - but I would definitely say it is an interesting record. The standout track for me is 'Unforgiven 2' - one of their most underated numbers

Open mind
Speaking for myself I far prefer 'short hair/face furniture' Metallica to long-haired grebo Metallica, which is probably the converse for 90% of fans. I'm not a huge fan of over complex time signatures and excessive widdling and found too much of this on '...and justice for all' and 'Ride the lighting'. Because they ditched all this in favour of a more stripped down and accessible sound, rather too many 'fans' got unnecessarily wound up by this. Then again they would've got on their case if Metallica stuck rigidly to the same formula of the early albums.

Anyway, IMO this a quality hard rock album. Not quite as good as the black album, on a par with 'Load' and still way ahead of most hard rock and metal releases of the last 20 years. A couple of the slower tracks are a tad mediocre but the rockers here all hit the mark particularly 'Fuel'.

So, I say ignore all the tosh unfavourably comparing the black album onward period to the earlier stuff and be open minded.

Good for any other band but this is metallica!
The first 4 songs on this album are easily the best on the album. They are what make this album worth while and if the other songs were this good it would be an instant classic. Only they aren't! All the songs on the album are slow apart from fuel, that doesn't mean they are bad though. The songs seem to have a country sound to them and the guitar solos don't stand out enough, they aren't loud enough or fast enough. Although they are still there they seem to be hidden behind lyrics and slower guitar.

All of metallica's albums had themes, apart from load, reload, metallica, and kill 'em all. So well that leaves 3 but arguably their 3 best. Ride the lightning had the theme of death, master of puppets, it was the theme of control and domination, and, and justice for all had the theme of justice - so the lyrics in these albums meant more, in Load and Re-load the lyrics seem a bit meaningless and they aren't so strong, IN MOST SONGS, there are exceptions.

This album has the same sound to it as Load and that is because they were originally to be released as a double album. I prefer this album to load only because of the first 4 songs.

Metallica's older stuff was their best.
Kill 'em all - heavy fast and wild great guitar
Ride the lightning - better lyrics more technical and polished sounding, again fast great guitar, much improved vocals
master of puppets - fast again great solos, and lyrics, good vocals, 1 or 2 slower songs
and justice for all - angry, very technical, great guitar, vocals are dryer
metallica - divides the new and the old with one great mixture, it still has the guitar solos in every song, they are slightly slower most times, best vocals, mixture of fast and slower songs.

Load + ReLoad - good vocals, poor solos, country sound, slow, DULLER!
These last 2 albums seem to have a lot of filler songs and only a few real good ones which is very unlike metallica. they should have stuck to their older style which they were best at or perhaps just have released the best songs of these 2 albums to make one very good album instead of 2 ok albums.

The songs on these albums are good, don't get wrong. They would be good for any other band but not what i've come to expect of metallica.