DEVILDRIVER, ICS VORTEX, BAND I’VE NEVER HEARD OF BEFORE COVER METALLICA
In 2006, Kerrang! celebrated the twentieth anniversary of Metallica’s Master of Puppets by releasing Remastered, a re-recording of the entire album with each song performed by a different band (Machine Head did “Battery,” Trivium did the title track, Mastodon did “Orion,” etc.). I don’t actually remember that release very well, but the only track that remains in my in iTunes library is Chimaira’s cover of “Disposable Heroes,” so, uh, yeah, I guess I didn’t like it very much.
ANYWAY, I mention it because now apparently Metal Hammer is doing more or less the same thing in celebration of the twentieth anniversary of The Black Album, which made many of us feel ready for the retirement home earlier this month. I have no idea if this will be more or less cool than the Remastered thinger; frankly, a lot of the bands on the comp are ones with whom I am not currently familiar (Motorjesus?) or don’t like (Neaera). But Metal Hammer has released samples of three of the tracks, so you want to start passing judgment early.
The three tracks in question are covers of “Don’t Tread on Me” and “Holier Than Thou” by ICS Vortex and DevilDriver, respectively, as well as “Wherever I May Roam” by Callejon, one of the aforementioned bands with whom I am not currently familiar. Funny enough, the Callejon one is the most original reinterpretation — which is to say, the DevilDriver and ICS Vortex basically sound like the originals with new vocals, so your enjoyment of them will probably depend largely on how much you like those artists in general. Callejon, on the other hand, got crazy with it, and their version of “Roam” doesn’t resemble the original very much at all. That being said, it also sounds like bogus metalcore, so I don’t know if I should praise them for at least giving it a shot or condemn them for lacking creativity even in their attempts to be creative or what.
Give the samples a listen here, then argue about their quality, or lack thereof, in our comments section.
-AR
[via Metal Insider]
