The lyrics deal with the horrors of war and that appears to be a well-covered topic by Metallica. Then the main riff comes in and James yells “make his fight, on the hill in the early day! Constant chill deep inside!”. It starts with a church bell and then thumping F# power chords come in followed by a bass solo by Cliff, then a series of palm muted chords play then Kirk plays a solo that is really powerful when accompanied by Lars and James. The third number, For Whom The Bell Tolls, is a firmly established fan favourite (with Creeping Death, Ride The Lightning and Fade To Black). The lyrics deal with a geezer who has committed a crime and is about to go in the electric chair, such as “wait for the sign, to flick the switch of death, it’s the beginning of the end” and the chorus “flash before my eyes, now it’s time to die, burning in my brain, I can feel the flame”. The next track, the title track (Ride The Lightning) begins with a wailing riff from Kirk punctuated by Cliff and Lars, then James plays a mid-tempo riff which accompanies his vocals, which are more tuneful than Fight Fire. In Fight Fire the lyrics are about the apocalypse, with references to the subject matter in both the lyrics and the song itself has an apocalyptic vibe. The Fight Fire With Fire solo is amazing, but his real talent comes later on. James’ rhythm guitar, as I mentioned, is better, but Kirk’s leads are so much better. Enough about James’ new style of singing, let’s move on to the guitars. Now, don’t get me wrong, but on the first listen it sounds like just a repetitive ‘fight fire with fire!’ but when you’re used to his change in vocal style you would be glad you took out £13.99 or however much it costed before iTunes took over. Then it straight away goes into chorus of “Fight fire with fire!, ending is near!, fight fire with fire! Bursting with fear!”, then returns to that impossibly fast riff I mentioned earlier. “Do!, un!, to others!, as!, they’ve!, done to you!, but!, what!, the hell is!, this!, world!, coming to! (to) (to)”. Then when the fast intro has taken place, James comes in with a reverberated (slight echo), low pitched, almost death metal bark. When you load the disc and press the play button (or just tap it on the screen if you’re techno-savvy) you are greeted with a medieval sounding acoustic intro (which sounds pretty much like nylon strings) which fades in to the fastest, heaviest song Metallica have ever done! (except from maybe Dyers Eve). Judging by that summary, you thought the bands heavy phase was gone. So if you loved the raw scrape of Kill ‘Em All, you were in for a surprise, as for the first time in the band’s then 3 year history, you heard an acoustic intro, a ballad and a radio-friendly song in the vein of Def Leppard, or (yikes!) Bon Jovi. Released on the 27th of July 1984 under Megaforce Records and produced by Flemming Rasmussen (who worked with the boys for 2 more albums), it had a much more polished sound to it. As my Metallica series in the PP continues, we are looking at LA thrashers Metallica’s second offering, Ride The Lightning.
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