Metallica – Metallica

Awesome pressing. I love to just crank this one up. I like the marbled semi-transparent vinyl. It looks great but isn’t too crazy.

This is a truly wicked album, and the sound quality is killer. Instruments are crisp, clear seperation, no surface noise on my pressing.

Anyone compared this to the recent remaster from later in 2021??

I have a copy of this pressing and a regular black one from Fall 2021 (this: https://www.discogs.com/release/20138908-Metallica-Metallica). This marbled copy (bought directly from Walmart) had debris on the record upon opening, it has surface noise, and the poly lined inner sleeves are the thinner/cheaper paper kind (Pallas usually uses the nicer ones w/ more waxy feel on the outside-- I've never known Pallas to use this cheaper type... it's odd). The plain black copy came out cleaner, has a quieter surface, and the nicer waxy poly-lined inners.

That said, I prefer the sound of the marbled pressing. Could just be a case of this being a hotter stamper. I did an A/B comparison between the two, and the sound is slightly different on some tracks and VERY different on others. For instance, on "Wherever I May Roam" the kick drums and bass are tighter overall on the marbled version, while on the black vinyl the mids/highs are more pronounced, therefore the guitars sound a bit more forward. The mastering on "Of Wolf And Man" sounds like a different remaster altogether; it sounds far more powerful and in-your-face on this marbled version. Both of them unfortunately suffer from sibilance on "Nothing Else Matters". I like them both and could recommend either one, but the marbled copy I got just has more impact/punch.

High end on this is WAY too loud on my end, holy hell. Don't have the original walmart one to compare but this sounds pretty good otherwise

My version has the same etching in the run out, but does not have a upc sticker. The upc on the jacket is 8 50007 45272 8.
The download card has Metallica on it, not the snake.
Same hype stickers as well.

Sounded great until I got to disc 2. A little surface noise and then nothing else matters comes on and the sibilance kicks in. The 2016 release has the same problem. Ordered from Walmart site.

The colored vinyl is pretty sweet though.

My labels appear to be grayer or black compared to these photos.
Copyright on the back cover is © 2020 .
All other information seems to match; deadwax info, mastering engineer (Reuben Cohen), etc..

There’s two different Walmart versions and this is the one I purchased recently in store. With this one, the records are much more darker than the other Walmart version, not to mention different UPC’s as well.

Comparing this to the 2014 US version I own below, this is much cleaner sounding in the high end frequencies, as the 2014 version I own gets very fatiguing sounding especially at higher volumes. It’s also very punchy, albeit maybe ever so slightly less than the 2014 version, but not enough to complain about, still has plenty of bass!

I’ve also preordered the 2021 Rhino/Blackened from Amazon due to arrive soon and I will update this review if necessary, being that version sounds better. For now, this Walmart version is the one to get. In my area there’s several copies of these at just about every store I visit and might be available online as well but just remember there’s two different Walmart versions.

https://www.discogs.com/Metallica-Metallica/release/6007719

EDIT: I was finally able to listen to the one I bought off Amazon. This is a black wax copy and looks to have been pressed at the same time and location as this “Walmart exclusive”. I prefer the black wax LP’s I bought off Amazon, it sounds even better than this one above. Here’s the link to it, incredible!

https://www.discogs.com/release/20138908-Metallica-Metallica