Wait, am I thinking of the same album? Isn’t Justice the one where they hazed Jason and pretty much completely dumped the bass from the mix?
I could never understand that. I read that in Wiki too and when I listen to the tracks from that CD I can feel the bass guitar on most songs. Maybe it’s the way I listen? (bass turned way up, preamp levels adjusted, etc.)
??
When I said well mixed I meant that the sound levels all seem to be consistent.
You don’t have one instrument(s) overplaying the others.
However, I listen to most music at about half volume with the bass turned up and the pre-amp levels adjusted to my liking. I didn’t get distortion or clipping like you found. Yet.
I’m playing the music from the original CD onto ripped digital tracks at 128 kbs and I’m getting acceptable sound. I was in a hurry to get this show on the road and I forgot to change the setting to at least 196 kbs.
The big test will come this weekend where I will be visiting a friend who hasthis thing to try it out on.
Should be fun!
I bought it on Guitar Hero the other night and played a few songs. Seemed good but I was concentrating on playing rather than listening. Will have to play it on normal so I can listen to it closer.
Incredible. So this album would have sounded better if they hadn’t clipped all the highs off for the sake of volume. Weird, I don’t think it sounds bad now.
The mix is one of the things I like best about it. That dryness is gone and the sound has that rich, crunchy goodness of Master back again.
Yeah, that’s just the way they’ve been recording albums for the last couple decades. They compress the shit out of albums these days to make them all loud, all the time.
On another message board, I posted these years ago as examples:
It’s the way albums are mixed these days and, frankly, I think it’s shit.
True, but as can be seen (All sizes | dynamics | Flickr - Photo Sharing!), the rich crunchy sound is something different than what I’m commenting on. What I’m complaining about is the result of pissing matches and one-upsmanship between record companies that compress mixes to maximize the amplitude, simply to make their song/CD appear louder than the next band’s (especially on a shuffled MP3 playlist or something, presumably). There’s only so much room in the waveform, though, so the compression has been constricting more and more into the meaty part of the amplitude band. As more and more amplitude peaks get clipped off, the effect is more and more noticeable. Many people would prefer that the sonic clarity remain, and the volume be controlled/provided by the volume control on the listening device.
“Master of Puppets” is plenty crunchy, but as you can see in the screenshot above, the waveform is healthy. You can see the thick band in the middle where most of the action happens, and then the periodic spikes where extra details, harmonics, drum hits, and other things occur that provide an undulating sense of depth to the mix. What was done with DM, and most major releases these days, is they maximize the heck out of that middle part of the waveform. This makes the “meat” of the recording louder (because we’re talking about amplitude, not frequency), but cuts off the punchy spikes that make it (often subconsciously) interesting to listen to. The uniformity of the “loudness” gives a lot of people listening fatigue, and the waveform spikes that are cut off result in a sort of static-y distortion, basically emulating what happens when you crank your speakers past the amplitude they can handle. Except here, it’s embedded into the waveform, so you can’t get rid of it by turning it down a notch, adjusting EQ, or buying better speakers.
As an experiment, I might take the “Master of Puppets” waveform from the screenshot and try to compress it to look like one of the “Death Magnetic” songs. If it works right, it should still sound “good,” and loud, but you would definitely be able to tell the difference in the lost details and dynamics.
I like this album, and Uncommon Sense, you’re right, the mix seems to be well-balanced enough (although I would love to take another cue from the old days and dial James back a tad and bury him in reverb). It’s just too hot, and we have no idea what kind of clarity in the drum hits, guitar harmonics, etc. we never got to hear because it was compressed out of the mix in favor of volume. There are at least a couple of those stupid online petition things out there to try to get them to re-mix the album (the mastering facility has said it was already maxed out when they received it) just to reduce the levels so that we can hear what it really should sound like.
Could it be that a lot of the systems people listen to the album on aren’t capable of playing the highest frequencies anyway?
Thanks for the detailed post troub!
I’m under the assumption that Metallica will have another release within a 12 - 18 months. This release was about 5-6 months late and according to people close to the band they’ve got a lot more material on the shelf. Not to mention, this CD was quite short. Good stuff, maybe great, but I’d like to see at least 2 more tracks.
Yeah, but the problem isn’t the frequency, it’s the amplitude. That’s why I guess this might be a little hard to correlate the visual image of the waveform (which is undeniable) with the audible effect–most people are accustomed to thinking in terms of frequency and pitch. The amplitude is essentially the volume fluctuations. A cymbal crash, or a bass drum, both have the potential to “pop” out of the mix to provide a little extra “oomph.” When you compress the mix so heavily, though, it literally smooshes everything to the middle so that nothing pops or stands out as particularly striking. More subtle is the very act of making the sounds on the guitar. Every strum, every fingering, every note in a given chord may have a slightly different intensity from strum to strum due to the fact that it’s a human being with human muscles playing it. Granted, in rock and metal guitarists use compression and distortion on purpose to hide a lot of this. But taken to extremes, it can provide a very artificial texture (Nine Inch Nails guitar sound, for a top-of-the-head example).
I really want to get home tonight and try to compress that MoP waveform to a ridiculous degree. Since we’re accustomed the mix on the record, the compressed version should sound particularly striking. (Unless I find out that for some reason compressing a recording that has already been mixed and mastered at a certain level just doesn’t work very well. I’m a casual hobbyist, not a pro by any means.)
I’ve seen Metallica in concert twice, but I’ve hated most of their stuff for the last decade or so. There were a few decent songs but a lot of pointlessness. I checked out The Day That Never Comes on YouTube, and I thought it fell a little flat in some places, but at least it got close - and in a few places it was right on. I’m intrigued by what I’m reading here.
Only for Metallica is 75 minutes short. 
The explanation of clipping here is great. I don’t know when or if people are going to start mixing music properly again.
Finally heard bits and pieces - I really like it; rockin riffs and Hammett is playing more of his modal leads and less of his bad bluesy leads.
**troub **- yeah, I hear you about the analysis of the waveforms. I hate overly compressed, overly loud mixes but what can you do? I think Rubin did a great job helping them get to the place they needed to in order to create the music, and the overall tones of each of the instruments sound great - but the finished mix is too saturated and would be better off with more space in it…but it still rocks!
I think the CD was about as long as it could be, minutes-wise. Only 10 tracks, but they seem to average over 7 minutes. A “Red Book” standard audio CD is up to 74 minutes long.
:: Post snipped::
GAH! I got this album a couple days ago and finally got to listen to it a couple times (I’m working too much) and Hammetts leads suck ass.
I mean seriously suck ass. I used to like his leads quite a bit (think Ride the Lightning/Master). Now all of his leads lack any kind of melody and are basically either bad wah fests or a simple pattern over and over and over and, well, you get the idea.
I like the album overall but it’d be as good, or maybe better, if the leads went away. Or if Hammett actually put a little thought into them. Which is kinda sad as Hammett is a pretty dang good guitarist. The lead work on this album seems to me to be tacked on with little originality or thought. The leads on their older stuff, while not technically amazing (though he is fast) always fit the song and took it somewhere. They all added something to the songs. On this album the solos feel like they were done by someone bored with the whole bit.
I do, however, like the album. I just ignore the solo-y bits.
Slee
Well - that’s disappointing; I had been focusing on the riffs and general structure of the leads; I wasn’t in a situation to really dig in. But I ordered the CD so I will manage my expectations accordingly.
I don’t agree with sleestack. This CD is different than the rest. Similar in a lot of ways, but quite different too. You’ll notice a ton of double bass, Lars must get leg cramps after playing. The whole CD had a different feel to it. Almost like they were trying to get back the garage days sound and feel. I don’t believe that Kirk was in a position to get creative with his lead-ins. The whole album is fast paced and the instrumentation usage is more collective than singular.
You guys notice in “The Day That Never Comes” how after the lyrics end you have the guitar battle?. If you listen close or merely pay attention the higher pitched guitar will take turns with the lower pitched guitar sounds with the drums helping set the mood. This goes nicely with the lyrics (which I believe are about spousal abuse??) because in the lyrics you have the man beating down the woman and in the end she presumably gets even or at least fights back. You can hear the same
elements in the guitar riffs that follow. Listen for it next time. Pretty cool if you follow along to that sort of stuff.
Reminds me of the pace of the song in “Four Horsemen” with the galloping guitars throughout the song.
The leads aren’t that bad. They sound like generic Kirk solos. The wah is gone for the most part and it’s back to the high speed modes and arpeggios. He’s playing with some weird slides and whammy stuff, maybe a little more tapping than usual, but nothing special. I don’t think he plays a lick we haven’t heard before – everything sounds like the fast solo to “One” – but the leads are servicable and they’re over quickly. I don’t think they hurt the over all experience, which is more about the riffs and the songs.
got it - that was the sense I got from my superficial reason; and it is fine by me - I listen to M for the riffage, not the lead work…
Ok, now that we’ve had time to listen and digest this new release…
How would you rate it as a Heavy Metal CD?
I’d give it an 8.5 for overall metal-ness.
How would you rate it as a Metallica CD?
An 8.
I would give Justice a 9. I could compile enough Metallica songs to come up with a 10 CD but as they stand I give Justice a 9 and this new one an 8.
Very respectable indeed, but Justice edges it out by a head.
If I were to compile a Metallica CD that rated a 10 I’d have to include
Blackened,
Justice,
One,
The Four Horsemen,
Whiplash,
Fade to Black,
Master of Puppets,
Sanitarium,
Orion,
The Day That Never Comes,
All Nightmare Long,
Beaten, Bruised, and Scarred
Honorable mentions to; In no particular order…
The Judas Kiss,
2 by 4,
Don’t Tread On Me,
Suicide and Redemption,
Seek and Destroy,
Harvester of Sorrow