Since the 1980s, Metallica has been a vital part of the music landscape. Rising from underground stardom to worldwide fame, Metallica has never lapsed back into obscurity. But after a tumultuous ’90s and early 2000s riddled with poorly received releases like “St. Anger,” many fans have assumed that the band’s best days were behind them. However, almost 40 years after releasing their genre-defining debut album, “Kill ’Em All” (1983), Metallica returns to pop culture prominence, thanks to an Eddie Munson’s (Joseph Quinn) cover of “Master of Puppets” (1968) in the “Stranger Things” season four (2022) finale.
Just months after the “Stranger Things” cameo, a November 2022 single, “Lux Æterna,” came with the surprise announcement of the band’s first studio album in seven years: “72 Seasons.” Seemingly capitalizing on their resurgent popularity, Metallica pulled out more promotional stops than ever before during the months leading up to the album’s April 14 release. Having held over 300 record store listening parties across the world, screened every music video on release night in cinemas worldwide, completed a four-night stay on Jimmy Kimmel Live and even hosted listening parties on Roblox, it is clear that Metallica wanted “72 Seasons” to be experienced, not just heard.
As the neon yellow on the album cover suggests, “72 Seasons” stands out in the band’s revered catalog, boasting some of their best material since the ’80s. Right away, it is easy to hear how inspired Metallica is: The album’s title-track opens with blistering ferocity, thrashing like the band’s lives are on the line. The track also introduces the album’s main lyrical theme: reflecting on how the first 18 years of childhood shape every year that follows. Frontman and lyricist James Hetfield has only written about individual struggle occasionally on past releases, but “72 Seasons” features a greater emphasis on working through personal trauma, using the album’s light/dark imagery to model enlightenment and adversity.
The second track, “Shadows Follow,” showcases the band’s dark side, jumping right into an dissonant riff built on an infectiously fun groove. It is the type of jam-inspired metal that sparks dancing, moshing and movement of all kinds, harnessing heaviness to flatten negative emotions. This momentum feeds directly into “Screaming Suicide,” a high-flying track throwing it back to Metallica’s speed metal roots with another lively, guitar-driven hook. The surprisingly youthful energy of the first three tracks seems to set up a record free of songs that overstay their welcome.
Unfortunately, “Sleepwalk My Life Away” and “You Must Burn!” stall all momentum, settling into mid-tempo grooves that sound good, but do not do anything beyond go through the motions. On a 77-minute record, these two stand out in a bad way, and their subtraction alone would reduce the runtime to a much more digestible 63 minutes.
These tiring tracks also take away from the immediate impact of the sixth track, “Lux Æterna,” which brightens the mood like an inferno, calling back to the pre-chorus of Metallica’s 1983 song “Motorbreath”: “Don’t stop for nothing, it’s full speed or nothing.” Embodying that spirit, “Lux Æterna” is a fast, simple and ultimately catchy example of Metallica returning to their youth — just a song about being at a metal concert for the hell of it. Metallica seems to keep the crowd in mind throughout “72 Seasons,” as the following track, “Crown of Barbed Wire,” is made for arenas to chant, churning on an ominous mid-tempo riff that makes up for its calmness with a killer progression. The next track, “Chasing Light,” reinvigorates the album in a different way. Like “Shadows Follow,” its destructive main riff exudes catchiness and energy — even before Lars Ulrich’s drums set the groove.
However, this pattern of positive feedback meets a stumbling block by the time it reaches “If Darkness Had a Son.” Opening with a 90-second riff that even beginner guitarists would find boring, the song’s engaging, double-kick driven verses start far too late — as does Kirk Hammett’s standout blues-shred guitar solo. Representative of a problem that has haunted Metallica throughout the 2000s, “If Darkness Had a Son” is a solid track made tedious by extended passages that could be easily subtracted.
Thankfully, “Too Far Gone?” ushers in the best three-track run on “72 Seasons” with four minutes of “Kill ’Em All” energy and brevity, leading into the epic “Room of Mirrors” with rejuvenated energy. As the penultimate track, “Room of Mirrors” succeeds at giving the listener yet another cache of hooks bustling with movement. Its country-tinged, punk frenzy culminates in a thrilling dual-guitar melody, accenting the lyrics’ desperate self-conflict.
Ending an already hefty album with an 11-minute odyssey might seem ill-advised, but “Inamorata” is the exception. The track goes in a completely different direction than the 11 preceding songs, settling on a slow groove characterized by the blues and dissonant chords. Detailing a toxic relationship with “misery,” the song’s first five minutes establish its melancholic mood and chorus before reinventing itself around the 5:15 mark. Here, Robert Trujillo lays down a poignant bassline, which Hetfield and Hammett nudge toward a cathartic explosion of dual guitar harmony like a moment of enlightenment. Calling back to Metallica’s classics, the second half of “Inamorata” uses this reinvented mood to bring back its previously mournful chorus in a new context, ending the love affair with “misery” once and for all.
“Inamorata” and its neighbors are so fantastic that they make less inspired tracks on “72 Seasons” frustrating: With an impressive command of melody, atmosphere and mood, it is hard not to wonder where this creativity is on “Sleepwalk My Life Away” or in the intro to “If Darkness Had a Son.” Although “72 Seasons” impresses in many regards, there is a lingering question of what could have been if Metallica had brought every song to the level of the last one.
Even without “Inamorata,” “72 Seasons” would be a triumph for Metallica, a band who many doubted could return to their past levels of greatness. While it is not quite “Master of Puppets,” “72 Seasons” is not merely a legacy album made to fulfill a record deal or kick-start a new world tour: It is a worthy entry in a legendary discography — an electrifying statement of relevance and longevity. Like his three bandmates, Hetfield is almost 60 years old, and in mockery of time, he sings and plays just as well as he did in his twenties. Metallica is still very much alive — and thrashing.
