Tool Engineer Recalls Metallica Album “‘Death Magnetic’ is so weird”
Tool engineer recalls Metallica‘s album “‘Death Magnetic’ is so weird mastering-wise.” We also know Joe Barresi for his work with QOTSA, A7X, Slipknot, and more bands.
He just worked with Tool for their latest installment 2019’s “Fear Inoculum” album. Also, this is the first album in 13 years, following 2006’s album 10,000 Days. Before that Grammy Awards nominated they also won in 2002 for “Schism” and in 1998 for “Ænema” songs. With this album, they also certified gold and the album achieved the Gold certification one year later of its out date.
In a recent interview with Let There Be Talk, Tool engineer Joe Barresi revealed about music, what he thinks for Metallica album, and more:
“John Bonham’s [Led Zeppelin] sound works with Jimmy Page’s guitar sound – you want the bottom sound? Well, that would never work in Metallica because those drums would never cut through Hatfield [Metallica] or vice versa.
“There’s that relationship of the parts, that’s the sum, and that’s what gives a band identity… It’s how they play together, and the sounds they make, and their hands, and things like that. And that makes a band unique. They’re unstoppable, they sound so good… And their styles – you’d lose that style when you start piecing shit together one at a time.”
He also touched Metallica album:
“The last one sounds killer! The one before that, ‘Death Magnetic’ is so weird mastering-wise. Mastering guys started doing shit where they’re mastering the instrumental version because there’s no vocal they can fuck with, they can make that punishing loud. And then they master the vocal, and then they kind of do their own mix where they put the vocal in there. And that’s how that shit happens, you can get this kind of volume and crustiness.
There’s all the grief where they blame the mastering guy, or they blame the producer, or they blame the engineer, or the mixer… And I’ve had it happen to me where somebody tried to take a mix and put it on from the stems. But I’m like, ‘This sounds like shit, just leave the fucking mix.’ You don’t need that many options. If it’s shitty, I’ll remix it. Call me up and say, ‘It sucks and I can’t do anything with this,’ and I’ll remix it. I really like the way the last Metallica record sounds like. Greg Fidelman took it back into the realm of…”
That’s a classic case of a band that’s still growing too. You listen to ‘Kill ‘Em All’ and then you go to ‘Ride the Lightning,’ and then you get to ‘Master of Puppets’ – every record is changing. Then Greg doing this last record… He did a bunch of Slipknot records too. And it sounds like old-school Metallica again. It’s a little more robust and tight and focused but still sounds real.”
You can watch Metallica‘s “All Nightmare Long” music video below. Also, order the Tool’s “Fear Inoculum” here and Metallica’s “Death Magnetic” here.
