Why the hell Reload? Had a few good tracks, but man other than that, not so great.

I'd put Ride The Lightning miles above Reload, but personally, my favorite is probably Master Of Puppets, maybe ...And Justice For All.

What can I say? I just really like several of the songs on the album. Prince Charming, Where the Wild Things Are, Attitude, Fixxxer, Slither, Carpe Diem Baby... All some of my favourite Metallica tunes. I like the 80's stuff too, but it doesn't grab me the way it did when I was a teenager. I don't do nostalgia, so those albums just don't mean as much to me as they did back then.

Dare I ask your opinion on the abomination that is St. Anger? I got a feeling you'll be one of those oddballs that really liked it.

Nice to see MOP well out in front. Justifiably so.

Well, I sorta like it. I sold it along with Death Magnetic a couple years ago, so I obviously don't like it all that much, but it has its moments. I like the style and the rough sound of the album. Much of the music has a kind of drunken, groovy, aggressive vibe to it that I find infectious but holy **** are the songs bloated beyond belief!
Every song could be divided by half and the album would be better. Also, Hetfields voice is kinda grating on this trainwreck of an album. A fascinating trainwreck. In my opinion, Crisis is a band that did the St. Anger thing way better, giving me no reason to slog through Metallica's flawed attempt at the same. Check out the Crisis album 'Like Sheep Led to Slaughter' to see what I mean.

I like them as pop rock albums, but the overwrought singing is a turnoff (James Hetfield is simply not a hard rock singer), and they're only alt rock albums in the shallowest sense. They're arena rock albums for 90s teenagers.

This. Half the songs on the album are surprisingly good, until they get past minute four, and you start reaching for the fork to stick in your eye.

I wouldn't have minded if Hetfield had dialed down the 'oooh's and 'yeeeahhh's and the way he ends every second word with an 'aahh'. I think the guitar playing was frequently a lot more textured than arena rock in the vein of, say, the Foo Fighters. I like the album, and Load too - but Megadeth's Cryptic Writings was in my opinion a more successful attempt at a similar style.

Whatever the case was or is with St. Anger. That album and me had a disconnect. I just don't get why they went that avenue in terms of production, sound, the whole works. Experimentation is important for a band, Metallica however got carried away here.

And for the first time in almost eleven years, I have a strong desire to go revisit all of their discography. Maybe me being burnt out on Metallica is finally over?

Any of the first four can be argued as their best. If I had to pick I'd go with Master of Puppets.

After the first four, it was all downhill. Black Album was mediocre, but after that it was all garbage until Death Magnetic.

It depends on the day for me. But I went Master of Puppets. I think Kill Em All is close. And in my personal opinion if you voted for Reload you should be banned from the forum (sorta joking but not really).