As we get closer to the 30th anniversary of Metallica’s fourth album, …And Justice For All, the album’s producer, Flemming Rasmussen, has now confirmed that the band are set to release a remastered version of the album later this year.
Amongst Metallica fans, one of the biggest points of contention is that of the bass in …And Justice For All, or, more specifically, the lack of it. Back in August of 2017, Rasmussen explained just why the record has almost no low end at all.
“What happened was [Steve Thompson and Mike Barbiero, the record’s mixing engineers] did a mix that they thought sounded really, really good, which had lots of bass in it,” he explained. “And the bass tracks on …And Justice For All are absolutely fantastic. (…) But, [the rest of the band] heard the mix and they went, ‘Alright, take the bass down, change this this this and this, and then take the bass down.’”
“So you can barely hear it. And then once they’ve done that they said, ‘Take it another 3dB down.’ Why they did that, I have no idea. It could be that they were still grieving about Cliff. I have no idea. But imagine my surprise when I heard the album.”
Since then, fans have been hoping that there might be some sort of remastered or remixed version in the works, or at least one that doesn’t sound so flat and tinny. Despite these calls, mixer Steve Thompson said earlier this year that the band have “no desire to re-mix the record. They want to keep it the way it is.”
Now, Flemming Rasmussen has contradicted these claims, saying that Metallica are planning a full remaster of the album, similar to what they did with Master Of Puppets for its 30th anniversary.
Speaking to Rock Talk with Mitch Lafon (via Ultimate Guitar), Rasmussen explained how he’s involved in the new version of the album.
“A remaster cut is coming out now. I’m actually in the process of sending stuff to Metallica and writing an essay about how it was recorded and what we did,” he explained. “The last year was the Master Of Puppets re-issue, and Justice is gonna come out this November I guess. Same thing – vinyls, loads of CDs, rough mixes, all the demos and the works and big book and everything.”
“I’m guessing that the main version, like the remaster thing, is gonna sound more or less as it did. But there might be alternative versions on there.
As for the sound though, well, maybe don’t hold your breath as to whether or not its going to sound that much better, because it doesn’t seem like Flemming Rasmussen will be too involved in that side of things.
“I know for sure that nobody’s asking me to remix it or anything and I’m pretty sure nobody asked Steve Thompson and Michael Barbiero to do that either,” he stated. “I think they’re gonna go with the remastering thing; whether they’re gonna stick more bass in there – I have no idea. But let’s see when it comes out.
“It was all recorded on two-inch tape. And I edited it so much that I’m pretty sure they’re all gonna fall apart if you start playing them now. You’d probably need to re-tape them together again. Whether or not somebody transferred that to digital, I have no idea. And the question is, when did they do that and what does that sound like. Because once you change the format, you’re fucked.
“But we’ll see. Probably in November it’s gonna be out. So we’re working on that right now.”
Check out Metallica’s ‘One’:
