Retro Spins: Metallica - Kill 'Em All

Metallica
Kill 'Em All
1983

As someone who didn't start listening to Metallica until the early 1990's when I was introduced to it in my long hair, leather jacket days I was listening to Kill 'Em All, Ride the Lighting, Master of Puppets, Garage Days Re-Revisited and ...And Justice For All pretty much daily. Metallica was big for me. They were practically the soundtrack of my life while everyone else was listening to Nirvana and Pearl Jam.

Then I got the black album and from there things seemed to get progressively worse for the band. At least as far as I was concerned.

Gone were the slick guitar licks, the pounding drums and deep lyrics. Instead I was getting shoveled ballads and radio friendly hits which could only spell one thing for the band. Sell outs. Don't get me wrong, I'm sure Metallica is very happy with the success they've gained over the course of their careers and I'm sure the money which came with it doesn't hurt. However, as someone who was so deeply into the band I have to ask. What about me? What about us? You know, all the loyal fans who took you from garage days and biker bars to stadiums?

Yeah, I'm a little butt hurt by it. So much to the point that I rarely bother listening to the group anymore, having given up with 1997's ReLoad. Oddly enough, it was Queen which replaced Metallica, and to date remains my all time favorite band.

Still, I have my memories of high school and how big a part of that Metallica was. I remember pumping out Kill 'Em All through my hand me down Sony speakers from my dad's old Hi-Fi system - Which inevitably blew out with how loud I played them.

My all time favorite track from the album wasn't actually one included in the original release, but rather the 1988 re-release, which was the version I had. I'm talking about the song Am I Evil?, which featured an all time amazing guitar solo from Kirk Hammett.

For those of you who don't know, Hammett is actually one of us. He has a passion for toys, comic books and horror movies - And can afford quite a bit of all of them I would imagine.

Though it was never my overall favorite Metallica album, that's actually Ride the Lightning, I loved the majority of the tracks on Kill 'Em All; Hit the Lights, The Four Horsemen, Motorbreath, Whiplash and of course the Cliff Burton monster, (Anesthesia) Pulling Teeth. There were many days my whole family heard this album along with me.

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