I don't know who or what ever gave Metallica the idea to "rework" their songs with an orchestra. Needless to say the (arguably) greatest thrash band of all time lost whatever credibility they had left with this album. Mediocre songs like "Of wolf and man" get a new sound with the classical addition hardly doing the song any justice. I might be totally illiterate musically, but hardly anything added to the songs by the orchestra is even remotely interesting. In fact it seems the band and the orchestra are playing different songs altogether all the time. As an old fan of Metallica this hurts. I can't help to think the wrong songs got picked for this venture too. For instance "Fade to Black" or "Creeping Death" would sound a million times better than "Sad but true" with a classical arrangement. I can accept that Metallica isn't a thrash band anymore. I'm not stupid though. An album like this won't renew my interest in Metallica. While the whole setup and idea is laudable, it is altogether too poorly executed to be considered "great". I would go as far as to state it takes a lot of goodwill to like this effort. I've only read glowing reviews on this site. Maybe I'm the musical fool, but this stuff doesn't sound right. None of the additions do Metallica justice (no pun intended). I'm sorry, but as a thrash fan I can only frown on this effort as it reminds me of what Metallica was and could have been.
Review of Metallica: S&M
