Product Description

Metallica turned the metal world on its ear with their debut album, KILL 'EM ALL and then blew its mind with the follow-up, RIDE THE LIGHTNING. The riffs and arrangements are moreintricate, the lyrics are more intelligent and biting and James Hetfield's growl is meaner. The set starts out with twotunes that would have been right at home on KILL 'EM ALL, but the next two are slower and more involved. "Ride The Lightning" is a slow (by Metallica's standards) dirge about the futility of war. "Fade To Black" is a ballad (!) that buildsto an instrumental coda featuring the guitar melodies that the band would later base their sound around. It's also Hetfield's first attempt at singing in tune. The most ambitious song is a dense instrumental, "The Call Of Ktulu", that starts with a single arpeggiated guitar and slowly adds layer upon layer, building in intensity until it all comes crashing down nine minutes later.

Track Listing

1. Fight Fire With Fire
2. Ride The Lightning
3. For Whom The Bell Tolls
4. Fade To Black
5. Trapped Under Ice
6. Escape
7. Creeping Death
8. The Call Of Ktulu

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #135 in Music
• Released on: 2007-07-02
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 47 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
Don't let that classical-guitar opening to "Fight Fire with Fire" fool you--Ride the Lightning packs a heavy-metal wallop. While not as ambitious as the subsequent Master of Puppets, this early Metallica album is indubitably one of their best. Thematically, it explores death and dying from myriad points of view: nuclear war ("Fight Fire with Fire"), electric-chair execution (the title track) and drowning ("Trapped Under Ice"). Interestingly, the best track on this album is probably "Fade to Black", a slower, more introspective song about suicide. There's also "Creeping Death", which remains a concert favourite. An excellent mix of rapid-fire guitar riffs, rip-roaring solos and singer James Hetfield's trademark growl, this is thrash metal at its finest. --Genevieve Williams

Customer Reviews

Metal perfection!!!!
Jesus how can an album now nearly a quarter of a century old still sound so fresh and exciting! Yep before metallica lost the plot and released mediocre albums (ie St Anger) they were producing monsters like these.

Now I have owned this album for over 15 years and when I still listen to it today it still thrills as much as the first time I heard it. Songs such as For Whom The Bell Tolls and Creeping Death are as devastatingly crushing and the quality of material on this album has rarely been bettered. The only weak point on the album is the instrumental track on the end (Call Of Cthula) but it doesn't distract you from the brilliance of this album. I'll be very surprised if Death Magnetic (due for release soon) will be half as good as this.

If you're new to Metallica or looking for a starting point you won't go far wrong with this.

Metal Perfection!!

Ride the Lightning... No, No Really Ride the Lightning
Now I want to star by saying that I am completely honest in my ratings off albums and don't let blind loyalty to my favourite bands cloud how I rate them. I very rarely rate albums 5 stars simply because to be a 5 star album it has to be nearly perfect. I can hand on heart though say that this is one of them albums. There are problems with this album of course there are, I have yet find an album with no faults but they are small and not really big enough to affect it overall.

This is Metallica's 1984 release and was their second delivering of thrash metal that would make all other bands at the time and even now look mediocre. I'm not the biggest fan of thrash metal because although I love guitar solos I prefer them to be delivered in different varieties rather than as fast as possible every single time. Metallica are however a thrash band that vary their music and show strong degrees of creative intelligence. On Ride the Lightning the `Tallica do fast solos but also have mid paced ones as well as the slow majestic beauty that is Fade to Black. This is a mix of thrash and slow melodic beauty that will draw you in and keep you asphyxiated until the end. Many reviewers have said that Lars is a poor drummer and that his beats are simplistic but I totally disagree, I think he's a very good drummer and although technically not the most proficient especially when compared to a couple of my favourite drummers Jukka Nevalainen (Nightwish) and Travis Smith (Trivium), but what he produces with Metallica is of a high standard. Lars is credited to 99% of Metallica songs and if he weren't in the band would they really be the band we know and love. Anyway I don't want double bass beats in songs just for the sake of having them, that's one of the things that ruin Epica's `The Divine Conspiracy'. James Hetfield isn't the greatest vocalist in the world but then again this isn't Power Metal but James is one of my favourite metal vocalists he's also a great rhythm guitarist and gives the songs an epic galloping feel. Kirk Hammett is one of the best guitarists in the world and although some people think ex Metallica man Dave Mustaine is the better guitarist, but I've always preferred Kirk. Lastly Cliff Burton Metallica's bassist at the time was the man credited with moving Metallica towards their more `progressive' approach to music because of his classically trained background. I don't know whether this is really true but he was a great bass player as can most evidently be seen on For Whom the Bell Tolls. Some people argue that Lars is weak on drums and that Kirk isn't as good as Mustaine (I disagree) but overall as a band they compliment each other perfectly. As a band they are a perfect unit... look at it this way in football you can get the 11 best players in the world but if they don't play together as, if they don't gel or compliment each others abilities they won't win anything.

Ride the Lightning along with Master of Puppets are Metallica's two biggest albums and essential to any real metal heads collection. Most people award Master of Puppets as the superior; I've always slightly preferred its predecessor although I can't really say why its just one of those things.

Two of the songs are co credited to Dave Mustaine (Ride the Lightning and The Call of Ktulu) but these are Metallica songs simply because they are better than anything Megadeth ever produced as a result I don't see Mustaine as having had any major impact on these. To make my point Mechanix is a song Mustaine wrote when he was with Metallica which Megadeth later released. For Metallica's debut Kill `em All Hetfield and co rewrote it and called it The Four Horsemen, which is the superior version i.e. any thing he does Metallica do better so any input he had here will have been redone only better.

Track by Track:

1) Fight Fire with Fire- A good fast and aggressive opening, once the acoustic intro is out of the way of course. 8.9/10

2) Ride the Lightning*- A fast more mid paced song compared to Fight Fire with Fire, but much better. This is a song from the view of someone who is on death row awaiting execution by electric chair. 9.2/10

3) For Whom the Bell Tolls*- This has one of the best riffs of any song ever, courtesy of Cliff's bass. This is one of my favourite songs from the album and a fantastic song live The only minor problem is it's to short, at 5.11 it's not exactly too short it just should have been more along the 8 minute mark, it needs another verse and a guitar solo. Even so it is such a fantastic song I still can't give it any less than ten. 10/10

4) Fade to Black*- This is the ballad of the album and also the best song here, and arguably the best song Metallica have ever done. The lyrics are about suicide and the song starts of with one of the best and most beautiful guitar intros ever the music gradually builds and gets heavier as it progresses. The outro is 2 minutes long and has fantastic couple of minutes of guitar soloing, possibly Kirk's best. 10/10

5) Trapped Under Ice- This is the thrashiest song on the album and is not as good as the previous songs or the last two, decent enough though. The closest song to that of Kill `em All 8.2/10

6) Escape- This is easily the most filler song and poor in comparison to the rest of the play list. 7.6/10

7) Creeping Death*- This is another brilliant song about the plagues of Egypt. There is also fantastic instrumental play and superb lyrics. This song kicks arse live much like For Whom the Bell Tolls. 9.7/10

8) The Call of Ktulu*- This is an instrumental and most people seem to prefer Orion from Master of Puppets, although I personally have always preferred this one as Metallica's best instrumental. 9.9/10

Overall Rating 9.18

Highlights*

This is one of the best thrash metal albums ever and better than anything Megadeth have ever done and is an important addition to any metal fans music collection. I believe this is better although only slightly than the more praised Master of Puppets.

One of Metallicas best.
Ride The Lightning is an amazing album the album before Master Of Puppets. The album opens with Fight Fire With Fire a really fast song with an acoustic intro, the title track is brilliant half written by Dave Mustaine (former member of metallica and creator of megadeth), next is the classic song For Whom The Bell Tolls awesome song, Fade To Black excellent song a slow but still heavy song alot of metallica fans at that time bashed metallica for selling out because of that song, Next Trapped Under Ice In my opinion the best on the album love the riff at the start, Escape and Creeping are great track butin my opinion the weakest tracks on the albums. Last track is the classic Call Of Ktulu a brilliant instrumental also half written by Dave Mustaine he deserves credit for this. This is a must buy if you're jus starting to get into metallica fantastic album. Oh one more thing that i would like to point to the people who say mustaine is an idiot and metallica do everything better then metallica YOU'RE AN IDIOT, it's clear that you obviously havnt listend to megadeth just the song mechanix have even botherd to buy Rust In Peace, Peace Sells or Countdown To Extinction they are all better then the black album put together now dont get me wrong i love metallica to bits but i also love megadeth to bits. So dont say mustaine is an idiot he has put out some of the best metal albums ever.