

(Also sticking to the full-length studio albums allows us to avoid having to discuss the immensely terrible album cover for the Garage Inc. The newest release is still too fresh to dissect. What was contained within is secondary for this exercise and 2) We stuck with just the previous nine full-length studio albums. Two things of note: 1) This is strictly based on artwork alone. So we decided to take a look at the history of Metallica album artwork and give a best guess at which artwork stands out amongst all others. Those classic albums also have some of the most recognizable artwork in metal history, adorning t-shirts, denim jackets, and bedroom posters for longer than most people would care to admit. Love or hate their post-Justice/Black Album material, pretty much nothing can taint their most classic releases at this point. When you are talking about iconic metal bands you don’t get very far through the conversation before Metallica’s name gets dropped.
