...And Justice for All

This album is definetly one of Metallica's greatest albums. It is evident that the band was evolving and making changes. The album has heavier guitar and drum tones than the previous ones, but at the same time they show their diversity as a band by incorporating softer parts that are beautiful and harmonic (One, To Live Is To Die, And Justice For All)
The lyrics also underwent many changes. The songs focus less on death, and many contain political statements in them. I consider the druming to be the best of all of their albums. It's much more fast and aggressive and definetely clearer and more audible.
My only complaint is that many of the guitar solos sound similar. Kirk uses the wah pedal a lot more, which gives the album a nice feel to it, but at times it gets a little old.
Some favorite songs of mine are: Dyers Eve, And Justice For All, Blackened, One, and as always Metallica delivers a kick ass insrumental in To Live Is To Die. Overall a great album that will go down in the history of Metal forever!

Ah, this album is a much talked about album in Metallica's catalogue. There are definitely flaws with it such as the poor production, lack of audible bass and some lifeless compositions but it's still a solid album and much much better than any of their future ones excluding Death Magnetic. This is also arguably Metallica's heaviest album and James' voice is very guttural, loud and heavy.

The first song is "Blackened" and in the tradition of past Metallica album openers, it starts with a slow acoustic part and turns into a super fast thrash cut. The Title Track is a complex and epic composition with some amazing guitar work from Kirk. "Eye of the Beholder" is a weaker track with uninspired guitar work and odd singing from James.

"One" is the album's masterpiece and the song that everyone knows. Nuff Said. "The Shortest Straw" is a decent song with a nice solo but nothing else stands out about it. "Harvester of Sorrow" is a slower song with some nice heavy riffs but a lame solo. It's also far too long like most of the songs on the album. "The Frayed Ends of Sanity" is a criminally underrated song and my favorite from the album. It's got mesmerizing riffs, a cool chanting part in the beginning, excellent drum work and one of Kirk's most blistering solos.

"To Live Is To Die" is an instrumental dedicated to Cliff Burton that just blindly goes from riff to riff but some of it is slow and heartfelt which is nice. It also happens to be far too long. The album ends with one of Metallica's most relentless songs, "Dyer's Eve". This song is just awesome with some great lyrics, a killer solo and Lars Ulrich's best drum work to date.

Overall, this is a great album and one that should be in any Metallica fan's collection if you can look past it's few flaws.

Killer Tracks:
The Frayed Ends of Sanity
One
Dyer's Eve

Filler Tracks:
Eye of the Beholder
To Live Is To Die (Sorry Cliff)

"...And Justice for All" is Metallica's last album of the 80's, and while the thrash sound that defined the band up until this point is still evident, this album paves the way for a transitional period leading up to the more "radio-friendly" compositions and production that would help to make their follow up album "Metallica" a legendary record, and establish them as one of the best selling bands of the decade to come.

This album is by no means without it's flaws: the first thing one will notice is that the bass tones on James Hetfield's guitar are more or less dialed all the way up, and at-that-time new bassist Jason's Newsted's bass guitar tracks were turned down pretty much to the point of being non-existent.

Additionally, the album production is very dry, whether it be reverb-less guitar and vocal tracks, or the almost unnatural "clacking" sound of drummer Lars Ulrich's bass drum pedal.

That being said, "...And Justice for All" contains what I find to be many of the best Metallica tracks ever. The band's sheer technical prowess, songwriting ability, and musical ferocity is apparent throughout the entire record. The 12 minute epic title track is perhaps my favorite metallica song ever, and the opening track "Blackened" instantly assaults the listener with thunderous double bass pedal rolls and blisteringly fast, chugging, down-picked power chords which will certainly get your pulse racing (unless you don't have one).

Some will argue that the second half of the album is mainly filler but I could not disagree more. "Frayed Ends of Sanity" is a very heavy, catchy track which gets you banging your head, and "To Live is to Die" is a beautiful guitar instrumental with multi-layered guitar tracks, moorish melodies, and decidedly minor scales and melodies thanks to fantastic lead guitarist Kirk Hammet.

While perhaps not the most consistent Metallica album, "...And Justice for All" remains my favorite, and is certainly a must have album for any heavy metal fan.

Released two years after the death of bassist, Cliff Burton, "Justice" is an angry, dark album that "crushes you" almost from the press of the play button (though not as intensely as their earlier work).

"Blackened" starts things off with a guitar solo crescendo (played in reverse from the original recording, by the way), before pummeling you with thrashy riffs and a warning to the consequences of nuclear warfare.

Next in line is the title track, which is my personal favorite. An untrained ear may have a hard time keeping up with the time signature changes, but you better get used to it, because they are found throughout the whole album. Over more "crushing" riffs, James Hetfield rails against the injustices of the world. You probably don't want to listen to this (or the whole album, actually) if you have a bad case of ADD, being that it's nearly ten minutes long.

Soon we come to the song that gained Metallica some mainstream exposure. For the numerically impaired, that would be "One". Outlining the harsh realities of war, "One" is arguably their strongest power ballad. I can never grow tired of the last couple minutes of this song.

After "The Shortest Straw", which is another favorite of mine, the album seems to lose a bit of steam. I say this only in the context that the first half of the album kicks some serious ass. There is "To Live Is to Die", which was a nearly ten minute tribute to Cliff and "Dyers Eve", which closes the album nicely with some killer thrash metal.

While the production of this album does have it's faults (I can barely hear you, Jason) and in hindsight, was their gateway to a more mainstream sound, "AJFA" contains some of James Hetfield's best lyrics, Lars Ulrich's best drumming and Kirk Hammett's best solos.

Final Verdict: 4.5 Stars

The last of the 80s Metallica albums, and Jason Newsted's début with the band, 'Justice' (as many simply call it) lacks some of the thrash metal lustre of it's predecessors and can be rightly considered the 'transitional' album from 'Master of Puppets' to 1991's 'Metallica.' But despite this it's still a cracking album, and contains several classics that stick out like tits on a bull.

The album starts with "Blackened", a song that oozes power and raw emotion from every chord, followed by "...And Justice For All", which has powerful lyrics but musically drags on a bit. "Eye of the Beholder" has a delightful little intro that echoes some of the militaristic themes of the album, and of course, there's "One". Powerful, truthful and bold, the album version has the strange effect of making you feel good, but naturally the music video will traumatize you to a point where even Little House on the Prairie will make you suicidal. "The Shortest Straw" and "Harvester of Sorrow" are just plain 'meh', and "Frayed Ends of Sanity" starts off with the band chanting 'Ow-E-Um' from the Wizard of Oz. Then, much to my dismay, it turns to shit. "To Live is to Die" is a heart-warming tribute (by metal standards) to their late and legendary bassist, Cliff Burton. The album then concludes with the up-tempo, "Dyer's Eve", the perfect metal jingle for those who hate their parents.

On the whole, I highly recommend this album to anybody who is 'Metalli-curious', and finds it sexually arousing to get their blood boiling in anger. 4.5 stars from me.

OK
Metallica saca este disco el 25 de agosto del 1988 bajo la marca de Elektra records.
En pocas palabras, es el mas oscuro y mejor trabajado album de metallica, ya que las guitarras llevan mas tecnica y no tanta agresividad como pasados discos. Esto se puede ver en canciones como "One" y "...And Justice for all". La distorcion tiene ese no se k que hace mas oscuron el disco, letras muy remitidas hacia la psicologia y no tanto a las acciones.
Tambien fue el 1er disco con Jason en el bajo.
Si eres thrasher y te gusta Metallica, este no te defraudara... y como dije no es tan agresivo como el "Kill 'em All" pero de verdad, es calidad pura.
Sin duda el mejor disco de Metallica hasta la fecha.

REVIEW HECHO POR:
GERARDO "GRINGA" CENTENO

This is in my opinion Metallica's heaviest album. The pain and frustration over Cliff Burton's death is very evident in almost every song. The only thing it suffers from is mild repetitiveness at times, but still very solid.

In my opinion, this is one of the best Metallica albums. Black was obviously legendary but And Justice for All is definitely #2. This album was the first to show some real maturity from Ride the Lightning and Master of Puppets. This is awesome "pump you up" music before playing a sport or just wanting to kick ass in general.

This is my 2nd favorite me Metallica album because of one song and that is "One" I believe it is the hardest hitting song they have that sounds good. The rest of the album is pretty good but "One" is a song that gets you going and pissed at the same time.

"Great album by Metallica, one of their greatest. Metallica comes out strong after bassist Cliff Burton's death, managing to sound heavier and craftier, with a more progressive sound. Great way to say goodbye to a friend."