1991: Slave to the Grind vs The Black Album

[Liquid Smoke]

As most of you old farts know, there was a "change in the air" in 1991. The big news that year was the rise of grunge and gangster rap. But two very different 80's bands on very different trajectories weren't done yet.

Skid Row's sophomore album was decidedly harder than their debut. My take is they knew that tastes were changing so they turned up the intensity while still keeping true to where they came from.


Metallica on the other hand was going for a wider audience. They started out under the radar but had a rabid fanbase. I think after tasting success when One aired on MTV they wanted to be rockstars.


STTG proved to be a minor success at 2 million albums sold while Metallica became one of the best selling albums ever at 16 million. For my money though, I'm going to go with the underrated classic and give this round to Skid Row.

Can this be pollified? Be cool to see what people think.

 

[Liquid Smoke]

Once again Bill Burr shows us the way.

 

[AGGAMEMNON66]

Skid Row was terrible.

 

[Kraysla]

Once again Bill Burr shows us the way.

I still listen to 88.9. Some good stuff at night.

 

[Philo-Publius]

As most of you old farts know, there was a "change in the air" in 1991. The big news that year was the rise of grunge and gangster rap. But two very different 80's bands on very different trajectories weren't done yet.

Skid Row's sophomore album was decidedly harder than their debut. My take is they knew that tastes were changing so they turned up the intensity while still keeping true to where they came from.


Metallica on the other hand was going for a wider audience. They started out under the radar but had a rabid fanbase. I think after tasting success when One aired on MTV they wanted to be rockstars.


STTG proved to be a minor success at 2 million albums sold while Metallica became one of the best selling albums ever at 16 million. For my money though, I'm going to go with the underrated classic and give this round to Skid Row.

Can this be pollified? Be cool to see what people think.

Black album wins easily.

 

[MadSquabbles500]

Metallica > Skid Row

 

[Luminosity]

Skid Row was cheesy AF.

 

[LEWIS540]

Thought Skid Row were terrible at the time and they have aged poorly on top of that. I understand why The Black Album gets quite a bit of hate but it is still a classic album imo.

 

[91 seconds]

My friend of miseryaaaaaayyyyeeee..

 

[Bluesbreaker]

Slave to the Grind, by a country mile.

 

[badascan]

Both really great albums and influential in my life. Couldn't pick one over the other. The Black album gets more shit than it deserves...

 

[weed]

best song on Black

 

[UFC=Pride]

Black album not even close

 

[Mark Cutting]

Of Wolf and Man

 

[IndyCovaHart]

This is apples and oranges.

 

[burningspear]

At the time it was Skid Row, never been a fan of Metallica but in '91 it was more about Nevermind and Blood Sugar Sex Magik.

 

[GordoBarraBJJ]

Not a big fan of that Metallica Album but it does have some decent tunes.

Only liked In a Darkened Room from that Album (slave to the grind).

 

[Satanical Eve]

best song on Black

best song on Black

It is by far the best song on the Black album. The song came about because of Jason Newsted who had this bass riff lying around that he presented to the rest of the band who loved it. They all proceeded to work the song around the bass line. Jason wanted the song to be an instrumental to follow in the tradition the band started with Call Of The Ktulu from their second album Ride The Lightning. However as the song morphed Bob Rock thought it would be better if lyrics were added and thus the song went from an instrumental to one with vocals. I mean fuck i would have loved to hear it without the vocals. Unfortunately the band hasn't released a version without the lyrics and its hard to edit it into an instrumental version without truncating the song some. Still an amazing fucking song and a great album from the band that has amazing production quality.

I have a 5.1 DVD-A copy of the album and it sound pretty good in 5.1

 

[TeTe]

Even though I wasn't a huge fan of the Black Album, it was better than Skid Row

 

[weed]

It is by far the best song on the Black album. The song came about because of Jason Newsted who had this bass riff lying around that he presented to the rest of the band who loved it. They all proceeded to work the song around the bass line. Jason wanted the song to be an instrumental to follow in the tradition the band started with Call Of The Ktulu from their second album Ride The Lightning. However as the song morphed Bob Rock thought it would be better if lyrics were added and thus the song went from an instrumental to one with vocals. I mean fuck i would have loved to hear it without the vocals. Unfortunately the band hasn't released a version without the lyrics and its hard to edit it into an instrumental version without truncating the song some. Still an amazing fucking song and a great album from the band that has amazing production quality.

I have a 5.1 DVD-A copy of the album and it sound pretty good in 5.1

this is hilarious because to me, as far back as I can remember I always felt the weakest parts of the song, large in part, were the vocals, next is Hammett's horrible solo after the fucking awesome double guitar solo. I always felt this song would have been so much better as an instrumental.

thanks for sharing this.