Metallica New Album: 10 Old-School Thrash Lessons They Need To Relearn

If you pick any album from the band's '80s period, you can pretty much count on a mind-blowing instrumental to fill a slot. While Cliff Burton first introduced the idea with his performance of "Anesthesia" on Kill Em All, the practice quickly blossomed into musical events, from the bass showcase of "Orion" to the frail pain behind "To Live is to Die." For as straightforward as Metallica songs have been recently, it might not be such a bad idea to take a chance on a new vocal-less outing for their latest release.

Although Metallica did present a worthy successor on "Suicide and Redemption" from Death Magnetic, there was something sorely lacking from this latest addition. Thanks to the album's more overdone production style, the more repetitive portions of the song ended up feeling too lethargic for their own good, and if you know anything about classic Metallica, "lethargic" isn't in their vocabulary.

This was a band who could take something as simple as 3 chords at the start of "Orion" and turn them into one of the most menacing sounds you've ever heard.

Whether it be through adding in new instruments or restructuring the riffs, a new pass at an instrumental track could end up becoming the next fan favorite amongst the metal faithful. Hetfield might be the face of Metallica, but the band might be able to show their chops a little more if he moved away from the mic.