10 Bands Who Weren’t Afraid To Change Their Sound

No hugely successful band have ever polarised their fanbase as much as Metallica. They led the way in the US thrash metal revolution when their debut album Kill Em All landed in 1983, before they produced Ride The Lightning (1984) and Master Of Puppets (1996), which took the sound to a whole new level, and are today still considered to be two prime examples of the genre.

But the death of their bassist Cliff Burton in a tour bus crash late in 1986 appeared to provide the catalyst for future change. Metallica next released And Justice For All (1988), which was the first sign of the band evolving, with the single One starting to gain them more of a mainstream success, helped by its heavy rotation on MTV. In 1991, they recorded one of the biggest selling records of all time with their ‘Black’ album, straying further from the thrash metal sound they had helped develop.

Metallica dropped the pace of their songs, leaning heavy on rock influences with the likes of Enter Sandman, and with full on acoustic driven ballads such as Nothing Else Matters. The album sent their success through the roof, and they all but left their underground metal roots behind with their follow up album Load (1996). Their shift in sound and a change in image was complete, taking great influence from the decades popular alternative rock scene, and with southern blues and even country music influences evident in places.