Metallica

METALLICA
"S&M"
(Elektra, 1999)


"No Leaf Clover"


I really don't like metal music, with two notable exceptions. The first is Linkin Park, at least when it comes to a few of their singles -- when they put out a greatest hits disc, I fully intend to pick it up. The other exception is this album. Metallica is perhaps my brother's favorite band of all time, so simply from being around him I've developed a basic respect for their musicianship and their intelligence. But let's not get the wrong idea here -- this is the only Metallica album I own and will probably ever want to own, and mostly because it's a radical departure from anything else in their discography.

The late Michael Kamen, best known for his Hollywood film scores (the "Lethal Weapon" and "Die Hard" series, amongst many others), has worked with rock and pop musicians before, mostly providing orchestral backing for ballads, but this was probably his most ambitious undertaking: fusing a lush, full, 100-piece symphony orchestra (the "S" in the album's title) with the furious, skull-shaking thrash-metal of Metallica (the "M", its stylized appearance on the front cover being lifted from the band's logo).

Everything about this album is massive ... from the length of the recording (more than two hours spread over a double-disc set) to the sound of the music itself (you can practically imagine the sweat flying off the San Francisco Symphony players as much as the Metallica members), to the energy from the live audience (who are occasionally invited by band frontman James Hetfield to sing out the lyrics in his place). Kamen comments in the liner notes that his goal in writing the orchestral accompaniment was to make it sound like it was always a part of the original songs, right alongside the electric guitars, drums and bass at Metallica's core. He accomplished his goal, bringing a whole new dimension to the band's sound, as if an orchestra was the only way to truly reveal the bombastic power of Metallica's music that has always been there.

According to a DVD documentary about the two-day concert from which this album was recorded, there were as many strait-laced symphony-goers in attendance as there were hardcore metal fans, and I have to wonder how many people from each camp came away with more of an appreciation of the other kind of music than they had before the concert. In any case, even if you're not a metal fan, don't be afraid to pick up this album. It's much more universally appealing than you might think -- perhaps that's why it went multi-platinum.