California - Music PPF

Metallica

Posted on January 25, 2023January 25, 2023 by Music PPF

Heavy metal band Metallica hails from the United States. James Hetfield (vocals/guitar) and Lars Ulrich (drums) started the band in Los Angeles in 1981, however the group has spent the most of its existence in the Bay Area. One of the “big four” bands of thrash metal along with Megadeth, Anthrax, and Slayer due to their rapid tempos, instrumentals, and violent musicianship. Hetfield and Ulrich, the band’s original members, create the majority of the songs, while veteran lead guitarist Kirk Hammett and bassist Robert Trujillo round out the current roster. They’ve had guitarist Dave Mustaine, who established Megadeth after being dismissed, and bassists Ron McGovney, Cliff Burton, and Jason Newsted.

In 1986, Metallica released Master of Puppets, widely considered their finest album and one of the hardest metal albums of all time. Metallica received their first Grammy Award nomination for their album…And Justice for All (1988). Metallica’s self-titled fifth album from 1991 was their first not to be primarily rooted in thrash metal, and it was a huge financial success, selling over 16 million copies in the United States to date and becoming the best-selling album of the SoundScan period. Metallica’s ninth studio album, Death Magnetic (2008), saw the band return to its thrash metal origins and was received with the same critical acclaim as the band’s earlier releases despite the band’s experimentation with new genres and directions in previous releases. After this, in 2016, they released Hardwired… to Self-Destruct, and in 2023, they plan to release 72 Seasons, their 11th studio album.

In 2000, Metallica spearheaded a lawsuit against the P2P file-sharing site Napster, in which the band and other artists accused Napster of illegally distributing their copyright-protected work without permission. Metallica: Some Kind of Monster, a critically praised documentary released in 2004, followed the band during the turbulent development of their eighth studio album, St. Anger (2003), and the band’s internal issues at the time. Metallica entered the Hall of Fame in 2009, and their music is considered classic rock. Metallica: Through the Never was a concert film released in 2013 that featured the band performing live against a fictitious thriller scenario, and in which the band members also produced the screenplay and appeared with Dane DeHaan.

Metallica has put out 10 studio albums, 4 live albums (2 of which feature the San Francisco Symphony), 12 video albums, a cover album, 2 EPs, 37 singles, and 39 music videos. The band’s past six studio albums (starting with Metallica) have all debuted at the top of the Billboard 200. They have won nine Grammy Awards out of a total of twenty-three nominations. As of 2018, Metallica has sold over 125 million records worldwide, making them one of the most commercially successful bands of all time. Publications like Rolling Stone have included Metallica on their lists of the best artists of all time, placing them at number 61 on their own 100 Greatest Artists of All Time list. According to Nielsen SoundScan, Metallica has sold 58 million albums in the United States since the company began keeping sales records in 1991. This makes them the third best-selling music artist of all time.

Testament

Posted on January 22, 2023January 25, 2023 by Music PPF

The Berkeley, California-based thrash metal band Testament is an American institution. Originally forming in 1983, the current Legacy lineup consists of rhythm guitarist Eric Peterson, lead singer Chuck Billy, lead guitarist Alex Skolnick, bassist Steve Di Giorgio, and drummer Dave Lombardo. Peterson is the last surviving founding member of Testament, however one of the band’s composers, Skolnick, who left in 1992 and did not return until 2005, has now returned. In 1986, Billy replaced founding vocalist Steve “Zetro” Souza, who had replaced Paul Baloff in Exodus, and thus began his tenure with Testament. He and Peterson are the only continuous members of Testament, with Peterson being the only one to feature on every studio album.

Considered one of the “big six” bands (together with Exodus, Death Angel, Lz Rockit, Forbidden, and Vio-lence) that helped define the thrash metal sound of the 1980s in the San Francisco Bay Area, The band formed in 1983. Testament is widely recognized as a pioneering band of the second wave of thrash metal, which emerged in the late ’80s, and a cultural phenomenon in its own right. [7][8] Along with Metallica, Megadeth, Slayer, Anthrax, Exodus, Overkill, and Death Angel, they are often considered one of the “big eight” of thrash metal. Since the inception of the SoundScan system, the band has sold over 1.4 million records in the United States. and more than 14 million copies sold throughout the globe. As of now, Testament has produced three DVDs, twelve singles, four live albums, five compilation albums, and thirteen studio albums (one of which is a collection of re-recorded songs).

After signing to Atlantic Records in 1986 under the name Legacy, the band changed its name to Testament and released its self-titled debut album in 1987. The following year, they released The New Order, which also received widespread critical acclaim and was widely covered in the press, particularly in heavy metal music magazines. Testament’s third album, Practice What You Preach (1989), was their first to break into the Top 100 on the Billboard 200 list, marking the beginning of the band’s mainstream success. [19] A series of critically and commercially acclaimed albums were produced in the early to mid-1990s. These included Souls of Black (1990), The Ritual (1992), and Low (1994). [19] Testament, who had been experimenting with a groove/death metal-influenced sound by the time Atlantic dismissed them in 1995, kept recording and performing until their extended sabbatical in 2001, when Billy was stricken with cancer. His disease had gone into remission by 2005, and he and Testament were back at it, recording the live album Live in London with the original lineup from The Legacy. Since then, Testament’s fame has skyrocketed; the band has released four albums in the Top 100 on the Billboard 200 (2008’s The Formation of Damnation, 2012’s Dark Roots of Earth, 2016’s Brotherhood of the Snake, and 2020’s Titans of Creation), and they have been on the road nonstop since. The band’s fourteenth studio album is now under production, with a release date set for 2023.