“But once we all found out that Atlantic had knocked us back the attitude was: ‘Fuck them! We were seriously pissed off about it. “There was always a siege mentality about that band,” remembers bassist Mark Evans. The band were furious with their label in the US, who didn’t like the band’s previous Dirty Deeds album and were poised to drop them. In January 1977, AC/DC entered Alberts Studios in Sydney, and spent two weeks recording what came to be known as Let There Be Rock. But then it should also be remembered that at the time they recorded Kill ‘Em All, Metallica’s principal songwriters James Hetfield and Lars Ulrich were just nineteen years old. The resulting uplift in quality is undeniable. That remarkable bass solo excepted, neither man had a single songwriting credit on Kill ‘Em All: by comparison, on Ride The Lightning, Hammett is credited with co-writing four of the eight tracks, and Burton no fewer than six. Which, in effect, it was: when Cliff Burton and Kirk Hammett joined the band on bass and lead guitar respectively, their debut album - save for Burton’s solo showcase Anaethesia (Pulling Teeth) – had already been written. In terms of songwriting, dynamics, musicianship and lyrical depth, Ride The Lightning is such a huge step on from the raw aggression of Kill ‘Em All, that it could be the work of a different band entirely. Metallica’s second album is, indisputably, a masterpiece.

With Ride The Lightning, Metallica had no such problems. Music industry professionals refer to it as Difficult Second Album Syndrome, the condition whereby an emerging artist storms into the spotlight with their first album and then discovers that, after 18 months on tour promoting said release, they have no idea what to do for an encore.

Rock opera albums