10 Times Metallica Attempted Career Suicide

2. Metallica (The Black Album)

By 1991, the band had already achieved platinum success on their own terms. They won the first of many Grammys and were selling-out arenas worldwide with their uncompromising, epic-length music. But rather than following-up with another collection of songs that would give Dream Theater carpel tunnel syndrome, they put out the Black Album€12 tracks of simple riffs and more introspective lyrics, each clocking in at less than seven minutes, and not a single thrash tune to be found. Though sonically their heaviest, the slower tempos upset many of its longtime fans (most of whom ignorantly assumed speed had anything to do with whether or not a song blew your face off). But its success gained them millions of new ones. It€™s important to note the popularity and relevance of thrash metal was waning at the time. Only bands willing to move beyond the built-in limitations of the genre would survive relatively unscathed. Metallica may have been blessed with such foresight, but that was still no guarantee the effort to overhaul their sound would be successful. Think about it... Metallica were already critical darlings, with albums selling in numbers most bands could only dream of. Even MTV had warmed up to them. Remaking Puppets or Justice would have been the more logical (and safe) course of action. Instead, they took the single biggest risk of their entire career. If Metallica hadn't taken this plunge into unexplored territory, chances are the list you're reading right now wouldn't even exist. Love it or loathe it, you have to admit the Black Album is anything but a sell-out.