Changing fonts is often a subtle way to tell you that a band has in fact changed. If you doubt my logic, look at the first 4 metallica albums, and everything after. You can tell the distinct moment they changed by the font on their album. Gone are the days of .hopesfall. we now have HOPESFALL with a run together S and F. While change is not an inherrently bad thing, it's my opinion that this new direction is a change for the worse.

On A-Types, the music has been severly stripped down, and where it hasn't it has been downplayed, and drown out by the new vocal stylings featured. The vocals themselves have changed drastically no longer featuring the screaming and singing harmonies and such. It's now just a really forced singing with they ocasional attempted at a growl (which fails miserably)

I am however sure plenty of people will be pleased by these changes. It's probably much more appealing to the masses, but in my opinion it's just watered down and disapointing.

Being a band that sounds slightly better than every other band that sounds like it doesn't matter when every band in existance seems to sound just like you. Some of it's catchy, it's all "fun" but bottom line is, there are a dozen bands you could buy a cd from and probably not even notice they are a different band.

If you had no knowledge of Metallica except of them in the Master of Puppets era, assuming they would tour with the likes of Limp Bizkit and Linkin Park would be entirely laughable. The fact that it happened can only be described as sad.

Change is not a bad thing inherrently. Metallica changed bassists and still managed to not suck. And Justice For All Maintained the quality of musicianship and still retained the general social punch and harshness of metal. Even the black album while more comercial was not entirely an awful change. It left some more hardcore fans distressed but all in all it could have been worse.

It got worse. Load could have been more accurately called "Load of Crap". While it certainly had it's moments the fact that the mediocrity and the lack of metal at times was unacceptable. I'm sorry, when your band is named Metallica, you are not allowed to play anything but metal. That's how it works. If you had "DJ" or "MC" in your name, obviously you would be limited to the respective genre's so it is not out of place to suggest Metallica should be limited.

Now, while Load was a disapointment, Re-load was merely everything that wasn't good enough to make it on to load. That is 2 bad cd's in a row. They lost the ability to write a song that lasts for more than 5 minutes. They lost the ability to write good old fashioned metal. They lost the ability to write creatively. Songs should not have sequels unless they were actually inteded to have sequels. If they do have sequels, they should be DIFFERENT SONGS. Unforgiven 2 was basically Unforgiven, except with...a two. That is unacceptable from a band often called "The Best Metal Band Ever".

Now, after two dud's they had a chance to redeem themselves. Instead of choosing a creative path they choice an often used cop out. The cover cd. Garage Inc. a so called "return to root" was just them playing other people's songs. La de da, any band can do that. It's not hard to play other people's songs. I admit, it sounds pretty decent, but considering it took 0 creativity or drive, I give them no credit for it.

So what next? New material? No. They try to win over fans with all their old material with "gasp" an orchestra. Real cutting edge guys. Real cutting edge (that is sarcasm)

Anyways, finally they come out with a cd of new songs. A return to the harsh older days when they actually kicked ass, or so was said. This is a lie. They still are completely unable to make a song last more than 5 minutes without sucking. The lyrics pack no punch at all. James Hetfield actualyl says "fran tick tick tick tick tock". That is not clever, that is not creative, that is not bad ass... that is dumb. They even went to extreme lengths to make the cd sound "raw" and "harsh. What they really did was make it sound like "crap". There is a certain sincerity they had with their old recordings. Thats why the "rawness" was acceptable. The way the recording sounds on St. Anger is only shit and can not be explained away. I don't care the "reason" for it sounding like that. It is not pleasing to the ear in anyway. It doesn't sound bad ass, it doesn't sound rebellious it sounds ridiculous. The removal of solos was a huge cop out. They could have easily made room for solos. Solos would have easily fit. I am not saying songs require solos. I am not saying they need it. I am saying that solos are a part of metallica. Metallica is no more. Metallica was crushed by a bus, and that's the way it is.

Nothing, and I mean nothing can make up for the fact that he says "Fran tick tick tick tick tock". Nothing. I'm sorry. Whats worse, the sound quality is pure shit. I'm sure they went to extreme lengths to make the drums sound "raw" like that. Well, they sound pretty "raw" like "raw sewage". This is awful, and no one will ever convince me otherwise.

Who would have thought a song screaming "God Hates Us All" would be so darn catchy? However, if you are a fan of metal I garuntee you will find yourself bobbing your head to it as you listen. You may even have to hold back from singing it under your breath when you're around people. (Unless you're just evil in which case you'll take delight in screaming it at crowds.

Anyways, while other metal bands seem to be scraping the bottom of the barrel and attempting to convince people they are back to their youthful style and being heavier than ever while maintaining their "experienced" outlook on life when they really mean they are releasing mediocre albums that would have been considering heavy about 20 years ago, Slayer manages to kick more ass than ever.

This cd however manages to stray away from the cliche's of the usual metal scene. While they talk about death and such, they manage to give off the sense of sincerity by keeping the lyrics more of a usual speach and less of a Dungeons and Dragons game. Though you make question the lyric in the song "New Faith" where all the instruments cut out and he screams "I keep my bible in a pool of blood so that none of its lies will affect me." (I still have yet to figure out how keeping a bible in blood would prevent any affects)

The entire cd manages to be intense, and generally not get stale. There still is variance, in tempo getting slower around Seven Faces though it still manages to deliver an intense metal experience. Of course you have to end a cd like this as chaoticly as possible, and the song Payback does that verbalizing the physcial pain he'd like to put well, someone through it seems. Quite harsh indeed.

Overall, while other bands are just growing old, Slayer is getting better. If you're a fan of heavy metal, give this a listen.