30 Years Ago Today!!

Fat Freddy wrote:

Boris2008 wrote:

I'm pretty much the opposite of FF on this one. Over the years I've become less critical and realised that it's a flawed gem. At the time I hated the sound of it and it was the end of a love affair.

Oh yeah, don't get me wrong, I still enjoy the album to this day, but as I've gotten older I've obviously grown out of the "Holy sh** this is the BEST ALBUM EVERRRRRR" mindset I had when it was current, haha.  

The production values never bothered me much (then or now), however I've always felt kinda bad for Jason that his bass work was never really heard. Whether it's true they turned it down in the mix as a joke or whatever never sat right with me. That was a dick move on James & Lars and the first of what would seemingly become more prevalent in the future.

Metal Shop debuted it on air a week or so before it's release. I had it on a 90 min TDK, and like Freddy I thought I was the shit. And also like Freddy, aside from my roommate and few other metalheads on campus, no one cared. Their loss.

The first album I ever bought and my favourite Metallica album - the only thing that ever bothered me about the production was when I listened to the album on a stereo console - it would produce this annoying "ringing" sound in the background, which I later found out would be alleviated by actually turning down the "bass" setting on the stereo - to me, the production is part of the charm of the album and I would have it no other way - I also really like the snare sound - although the Black Album probably features the best drum sound (and overall production) I've ever heard.

There are maybe two or three parts of the album where you can sort of hear the bass...if you listen extremely closely.

I have even brought this up on message boards before, and one guy even decided to give a close listen upon what I posted (he never noticed the bass, like many), and he noticed it for the first time a couple of frets could be heard when I pointed out where I could hear it.

CrookedCross wrote:

I saw RIP Magazine and another page on Facebook had erroneously posted this album as being released on August 25th, 1988 Saturday (the Wikipedia page is now showing August 25th, also - I checked there Saturday and August 25th and September 5th(?) were both listed on the page in different spots, no idea why) - the actual release date was Tuesday, September the 6th, 1988. Hard to believe it will be 30 years, though - I still remember getting out of school that day and going to my friend Kyle's, firing-up the bong and listening to the albums on his turntable. To this day one of my all-time favorites.

https://www.metallica.com/releases/albums/4212/and-justice-for-all

This is my Metallica calendar from 1990 and it shows the date of August 25th on there as well, for the U.S release.

U.S. Release Date - Sep 6, 1988
U.K. Release Date - Sep 5, 1988
Japan Release Date - Sep 14, 1988

The "Harvester Of Sorrow" single came out in the U.K. on Monday 8/29/88.

9/5 was Labor Day Monday in the U.S. and thus 9/6 was a Tuesday. Remember that until recently new albums were released on Tuesday in the United States, although there were exceptions.

I used to have the 45 's from this album. I thought I was so cool cuz I had the awesome B sides like "The Prince" and "Breadfan" and even had some of the cassette singles. I coulgn't get enough of this one back in high school. I wish they would re release the singles like Maiden did a few years back ( I have like 6 or 7 of them) cuz they are a cool collectible. I know, like Maiden, the rare b sides are available on various box sets now, but it would still be cool.