Well, since I’m going on hiatus and trying to focus for my big exams, I decided to listen to
TH1RT3EN now because there’s no way in hell I’m doing it next week when trying to study. So, without further ado (however lame what follows may be)— *Dave Mustaine impression* You know why I’m here, rrrrright?
Sudden Death— The band really couldn’t have picked a better opener… mainly because this song is, by far, much more well-structured than the blistering “Never Dead” is. The juxtaposition of a very simplistic riff throughout the length of the track with long and extremely technical solos by both Dave Mustaine and Chris Broderick is one of my favorite aspects of this song— an epic marriage of their Nineties-era material and
Rust In Peace-era solos. Obviously, the 90 seconds of constant double-bass drumming by Shawn Drover continues to impress me; and my only gripe about this song is that Chris’ solo right before that section is too soft, which is the complete opposite from
Endgame but is going too far in the other extreme.
For this album, little effects such as a gong when transitioning to the main riff and shifting about the output positions were added, which I felt were a nice touch, and helps it to set itself apart from the Guitar Hero version. 10/10!
Public Enemy No. 1— The first single from the album; “Public Enemy No. 1” is a more a hard rock song than it is a metal song, meaning that about half the band’s fanbase have struck it off as inferior.
However, this is in fact and excellent tune with great hooks and technical solos reminiscent of
Rust In Peace— Chris’ first solo will surely hold one of the top spots in my list of favorite Megadeth solos. The riff, as some have pointed out, is basically “Tears In A Vial” with the chord progression reversed; but making comparisons will get us nowhere because it’s not like “Tears” is the only song in the world with a galloping riff. This sets itself apart well enough, so I give it a solid 9/10.
Whose Life (Is It Anyways?)— David Ellefson announced beforehand that there was a punk-influenced bassline is this one, but it goes a lot further than that. This entire track is very upbeat with significant influence from punk rock, which has not really been shown in Megadeth since the
So Far, So Good… So What era and was a nice change in pace. Dave comparing it to “Peace Sells” shows as the chorus is incredibly catchy and memorable, and the song should definitely be anthemic for the younger side of the Megadeth fanbase. Great leads and drumming too. 9/10.
We The People— Megadeth doing groove metal?
Seems like a drastic difference, but songs like these are what makes
TH1RT3EN stand out as a Megadeth album. I loved the intensely ominous intro to this one, but it seemed a little out-of-place when the song transitioned into a mid-tempo groove. Either way, this song has another great, catchy chorus and politically-charged lyrics to make sure that it stays unforgettable. The riffs are both high in quantity and quality alike, and the clean, “Clairvoyant” (by Iron Maiden)-style outro was nicely done— I’m left unable to imagine this song without it, frankly. 10/10!
Guns, Drugs & Money— I didn’t have high hopes for this one after Ellefson compared it to Green Day, but gee, thanks for scaring me for no good reason, Junior.
This track is still distinctively metal (maybe not of the thrash variety, but it’s metal nonetheless, thank you) and is an excellent one at that. The beauty of this track
is indeed in its simplicity; and it was interesting to see how much the vocal melody made the (once again, incredibly catchy) chorus stand out from the verse with the same riff underneath both. The layered vocals during the pre-chorus were a very nice touch as well, which sets this album aside as a more well-produced one than the previous two releases, IMO. 10/10!
Never Dead— There’s a number of reasons why this track is my least favorite out of a collection of superb tracks: firstly, the structure of this song is rather poor with an overly-long intro and an overly-short solo section; secondly, some of the fanbase is hailing this one as the best on the album just because it’s the closest thing to
Rust In Peace II, which I’m pretty sure they should know by now is a pipe dream. Despite all that, I can appreciate this song for its making me want to headbang and for yet another strong, melodic chorus which sets it apart from its pseudo-thrash counterpart on the last album, “Head Crusher.” The solowork, although lacking in amount, was very well-done nonetheless. 8/10.
New World Order— Apparently, this song has been incomplete up till now; but I really don’t see much added onto it as compared to the versions on
Warchest and the remastered
Youthanasia. The guitars sound inconsistent in terms of tone with the rest of the album, however, which is probably this track’s only flaw. Other than that, it was great to see the current lineup of the band finally play this song; but something didn’t sit right with the drumming during the second, faster portion of the song (the sound of Shawn’s toms just don’t sound powerful enough). Either way, it was a great remake with special note of an excellent vocal performance by Dave. 9/10.
Fast Lane— This might be the second-weakest track on the album simply because it wasn’t as memorable as the others. Ironically enough, this song doesn’t live up to its name at all despite being relatively aggressive. The lyrics are about driving fast (how’d you guess?) in the same vein as “502,” and it really makes me wonder if Dave was listening to Guns N’ Roses’ “Nightrain” while writing them.
The tempo change at the three-minute mark screamed “Wake Up Dead” the first time I heard it, an impression that was accentuated when I heard the solo that shortly followed. However, this is another track where the louder rhythm guitar tracks actually work against the song, because the solos can’t be heard very well over them in this case. Probably the most filler out of all this album’s songs; 8/10.
Black Swan— I thought the big solo at the beginning sounded tacked-on when I listened to that bit (just that bit, BTW) on its own, but it actually works as a nice intro and a good transition from the end of “Fast Lane,” creating a flow instead of slowing down the album. However, the second solo that was added was, in my opinion, unnecessary and it sounds out-of-place. I wouldn’t say this ruined the track, however. I really can’t empathize with the amplified fanboyism for this track in the fanbase if it’s just relative to the remake of “A Tout Le Monde” which was going to be the original bonus track for
United Abominations (and I preferred the latter anyway), so I don’t see the extra solos as
adding legs to a snake. 8/10.
Wrecker— The intro reminded me of “The Devil You Know” off of Anthrax’s new release, and the track as a whole sounds similar to some extent, being another thrash song with some noticeable traces of punk influence (both musically and lyrically). The riff is something you can really get into, and I’d definitely say that Shawn’s drumming on this track is noteworthy. As for the lyrics, I thought this was a step down from what Dave usually writes, but for this song, the positives outweigh the negatives by far. 10/10!
Millennium Of The Blind— Out of all the remakes on this album, “Millennium Of The Blind” is by far the most drastically modified one— not a bad thing, though. This track starts off with a creepy-sounding lick and a clean riff. In fact, this entire song is just very foreboding overall and builds up a lot of tension. It’s somewhat a doom metal song in the sense that the tempo is very slow for Megadeth standards throughout, and the band has pulled it off nicely with great lyrics and some of Chris Broderick’s best solos on the record. 9/10.
Deadly Nightshade— Now
this one I can see fitting in on
Youthanasia, mainly because of its more mid-tempo nature. The intro/chorus riff is incredible, and the verse riff is probably one of the heaviest on this album. David Ellefson especially shines in this one because the bass does take control of the song at many points, which was a very nice bonus since the bass has been basically buried for the last three Megadeth albums now. Dave’s vocal delivery on this song is amongst the best in recent years and on
TH1RT3EN, and I
will call blatant lies if you say that you don’t want to sing along during the chorus— out of all the catchy choruses on this album, “Deadly Nightshade” just takes the cake as the best. 10/10!
13— And so our 57-minute long journey through Megadeth’s career comes to an end… with a six-minute long journey through Megadeth’s career. Now Dave had earlier revealed that, while 13 songs had been written, only 12 tracks were going to be on the non-Japanese releases of the album; and while I have no knowledge whether “13” would’ve been cut off instead of one of the other songs, I am glad this made it onto the album anyway because this is one of the best the band has ever released.
I definitely have to agree with Ellefson that Chris did a great job on the acoustic and clean bits. I think that once you hear the intro— that can really only be described as beautiful— you will know that this is not going to be your standard Megadeth track.
Dave Mustaine is not the best vocalist in heavy metal music, and I will not try to argue against that. Nevertheless, I really hope that newcomers to the band will not go into this song while being blinded by critics of Dave’s voice because you can tell that Dave has done his best on “13.” There are emotional vocals all over this track and is undoubtedly his best vocal performance on this album.
Finally, I hope that the portion of the fanbase that DO want
Rust In Peace II do not label this as a “ballad” and push it into a corner. “13” is so much more than that. I do not think that Megadeth have ever done a song so moving as this one and, while it may start off mellow with the clean riff, soon strikes you right in the face with a slower yet powerful tempo.
The song picks up with an immense solo section and finally concludes with a slow fadeout, during which you can reflect on this entire album and realize that “13” is an amazing conclusion to this standout Megadeth album. 10/10 for sure!
TH1RT3EN does not seem much like a natural progression from
Endgame, but I will say that I’m happy the band is once again evolving. I did say before that most of the tracks being roughly four minutes long reminded me a lot of
Youthanasia, and this album is very similar to that one— but just in the aspect that both have good, hooky songs with very catchy choruses.
I subconsciously prepared myself for this record by wearing out Metallica’s
Death Magnetic for the past week— and I’ve never held back when discussing that album’s flaws, but that album is very similar to
TH1RT3EN in the same aspect: the choruses in its songs just work too well. They get stuck in your head, and for that one, I was finally able to quickly look past the length barrier and enjoy the album.
So, if
TH1RT3EN is similar to
Youthanasia in terms of song lengths, choruses, and even the background of the songs (remember that some of the music on this album was written around the same time the songs from
Youth were written); then what sets it apart? Well, I now understand what the band meant when they described this album as a timeline of Megadeth’s career. This is a very diverse album, exploring several unfamiliar styles of metal, sometimes even swinging into hard rock territory briefly like they did during the 1990s, and going back to the punk influences that— along with NWoBHM, of course— inspired the whole damn genre of thrash metal.
TH1RT3EN is a unique release by Megadeth, and while I still can’t put it into a ranked list of Megadeth albums at this point, I am confident that it will rank highly amongst other of the band’s finest works.
Topic: The "Review-an-Album" Thread (Read 1409 times)
