I saw a snippet of a promo video from the site on one of the early morning news/chat shows and it included a little bit of a new song.
I'll fully admit, it sounds like old Metallica. Being fully judgemental based on five seconds of one snippet of song, I'd say it sounded like "Load" era Metallica trying to do "Puppets" era Metallica.
Which is of course their plan. The "Master Of Puppets" album is the template for this new album. The band sees that as their peak (I'd agree) and is deliberately trying to figure out how they made it, and is trying to do it again.
I have no idea what they were trying to do with their other albums, but I'd be willing to admit this is the first time Metallica are trying to emulate themselves.
This could be interesting. That five second snippet sounded good.
James was even singing properly.
A technical note: The new album is in E tuning which suits James voice better (see the first five albums). Load and Reload were "alternative" tuning (that is E-flat), while St. Anger was mostly Drop C.
My expectations are low. I'm expecting an album around the level of the "Load" album, but will probably get something sounding like ten versions of "Struggle Within". Rumours are they're aiming for ten songs, all loooooooooooong.
Complex just like Justice...