Listen up crybabies and die-hard fans alike, we need to acknowledge one thing going forward: For the 30 year-veterans of the game; the old days are long gone. Every time the Metallica rumour-mill starts up, the vast majority of comments on the various fan sites or press releases revolve around the same regurgitated rhetoric; "Do another album like Master of Puppets/Ride The Lightning/And Justice For All!". Well you know what? They can't. They just can't. It's not that the godfather of thrash himself, James 'Papa Het' Hetfield doesn't have several lifetimes' worth of riffs at his disposal (quite the opposite if the news that the man himself is harbouring nothing short of 800 separate ideas, at the time of writing), no instead it's merely because age has set in. The once pugnacious, expletive-throwing group of snarling underdogs who'd more likely see themselves drown in a vat of Jack Daniels than do anything other than turn into rockstars...did exactly that. After a stint in rehab and a warts-n'-all documentary later, the band kicked out 2008's Death Magnetic, the first album with enough thrash sensibilities behind it to please the vast majority of fanboys, and those who have stuck by every album since listening-day one. Hey, I'm the latter here, I've written a 10,000 word dissertation on these guys and am still begging for more. However what happens when you follow up one of your most hated albums with a surprisingly brilliant return to form, is a total reset of the album cycle. We're back into uncharted territory, as Metallica must prove they've got what it takes to essentially make another sophomore album, being that anything other than greatness will provoke a wave of "See! I knew it was a one-off!"reactions all round. So, with a Through The Never poster adorning the wall, and a tattoo doing the same on my arm, let's gather round the fire of expectation and fan the flames of hyperbole, shall we?