I'm three days behind on the 31 days of Metallica project whatever, I started my weekend by sleeping for exactly 15h and a half, I only got myself out of the bed to get some lunch and make tea, I am, therefore, partying hard. So I am going to be mega-productive today and write a proper post (while still in bed) on one of my favourite LPs of all times, ...And Justice for All.
Released on August 25th, '88, ...And Justice for All is Metallica's 4th studio album and the first recorded since Cliff Burton's death. It differs from their earlier work through more complex instrumentals and more elaborate guitar riffs, giving the former thrash metal trademark a more progressive sound.
The main lyrical theme is political injustice, as the cover artwork suggests, portraying a cracked statue of Lady Justice, sometimes named 'Doris' by the fans, bound by ropes, with her scales filled with dollar bills.
Justice is nothing less of a materpiece throughout all of its 62 minutes and 25 seconds. Right from the very beginning, it hits you with what is the mother of all intros, the guitar solo opening Blackened, then unfolding into 9 tracks of heavy, complex riffs and constantly changing tempos, telling stories of war, corruption, and limitation of freedom of speech. Justice features One, my favourite track off this tracklist and of all the tracks ever released Metallica, based on the fate of a solider who was left limbless by the war, blind, deaf, mute, hooked to machines and unable to communicate with the outer world, despite the fact that he is fully conscious. The other tracks that stand out are Blackened, rather agressive, speaking about mass destruction, Eye of the Beholder, on the subjectivity of freedom, Harvester of Sorrow, about mistakes and grim happenings repeated as a mark left by an earlier generation, and To Live is To Die, a mainly instrumental composition written in the memory of former bassist Cliff Burton.
...And Justice for All is a definite classic, ageless heavy metal, a shout of protest still heard loud and clear through the decades. Horns up.
When a man lies
He murders some part of the world
These are the pale deaths
Which men miscall their lives
All this I cannot bear to witness any longer
Cannot the kingdom of salvation take me home?
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