Apologies in interrupting the lists, but after having a convo with the Mrs. over the weekend, I popped in LOAD for the first time in years. Nothing has really changed for me with that record. To me, it is a good hard rock record, but a difficult one to accept (even more than the Black album) coming from Metallica. However, it did spawn two songs I continue to really love:
Bleeding Me
Until it Sleeps
with an honorable mention to The Outlaw Torn.
I know it has been a decades old argument about Metallica, but they became such a different band after ...And Justice for All. Same band in name, different band in goals and direction. I think AJfA was the ultimate pinnacle just because they made what I refer to as "prog thrash," and it really took thrash as far as I think it can go. Which is the reason why i understand what they did with the Black album and the Loads. But I've never been able to really recapture my fandom of the band post-Justice.
But on Load, Bleeding Me and Until it Sleeps are just excellent hard rock songs for the ages, at least IMO. And they had something good with The Outlaw Torn as well, but it wasn't quite on the same level.
On to Re-Load...I haven't listened to that in ages. I sort of remember hearing that Fixxer is pretty good. We'll have to revisit...