I had the highest expectations for this album, first off David Ellefson had finally returned to the band and this was his first album back with the band since "The World Needs A Hero". Second, I thought Megadeth was out of creative juice until they pulled a treat like "Endgame" out, so i had high expectations that they were gonna get back on the right track. But even before they actually released the album i was already disappointed, seeing that when the band revealed he song names i had already heard a large amount of the songs in the first place.
To start off, the first song on the album "Sudden Death", had already appeared on Guitar Hero so i was somewhat familiar with song even though they did a great job rerecording it for the record. Second, the 7th track on the album "New World Order" had been a demo song floating around for a while which was on the remastering of "Youthanasia" as a bonus track, but then again the did another great rerecording of the song. Now 3rd, the song "Black Swan" which is the 9th track on the album had already appeared on the Japanese version of "United Abominations" which turned out good but then again it was nothing new. Now last is another demo song which also appeared on the remastering of "Youthanasia" and that is "Millennium of the Blind". However they really gave the song a makeover, moving the intro towards the end of the song and then adding now verses and its own chorus (where now Dave makes it yet another political song). So to sum things up, by the time i actually received the album there were only 6 songs i hadn't hear yet because of the songs i just mentioned and the fact that "Public Enemy No. 1" and "Never Dead" had already been revealed. But the good thing of this, all those songs were great, they were nothing less of thrash with some killer riffs to add to it. My personal favorites were "Sudden Death" and "Never Dead" because of the great soloing, killer production, and overall song writing.
Now to talk about the 6 songs i didn't hear yet when i got the album. First off "Whose Life (is it Anyways?)" is an overall okay song, the lyrics are cheesy for Megadeth as well as the intro to the song as well. In fact most of these songs are cheesy for example the chorus to "Guns, Drugs & Money", it is such a simple, poorly written chorus and for me it ruins the whole song, the pre chorus however in this song is much better than the actually chorus itself! Other songs too like "Wrecker" just make me cringe listening to it, anytime Mustaine goes near a love song or talking about women i cringe. The whole song is a about how a woman or having a wife will wreck everything you own, the whole song is pointless. "Deadly Nightshade" is a pretty good overall song, the overall riff through the song is good, even though the song sounds more Mettalica based than Megadeth.
Now the title track on this album was okay as well, the beginning of the song (especially right at the start with the acoustic) had me cringing from Dave's vocals, to the lyrics as well. But the song picks up and has some decent riffs that come out of it, so overall the song wasn't bad nor good. "We the People" was a good song overall, fun and catchy but didn't rock my socks off. The last song i haven't mentioned makes me sick thinking about it, i would of given this album a better review if this song wouldn't of soiled the album. And that song is of course "Fast Lane", a total abomination of a song, from the brain dead 12 year old lyrics, to the mediocre rushed song writing on all instruments in the band. The whole song just screams rushed, it is a horrible filler written last minute with one of the most disgusting choruses ever spawned. Just take this part of the song: "Fast lane, like a jet plane Like a freight train, I’m driving insane", that whole snippet of the chorus shows the careless rhyme scheme that was written, absolute garbage.
My conclusion however is still more of a positive one. No, it didn't keep the momentum of "Endgame" going, and yes i heard a large amount of the songs before hand, i was still entertained by it and absolutely loved several songs on the album like "Sudden Death", "Never Dead" or "Millennium of the Blind". I wouldn't however say this is a solid album however because it does have its pot holes, but it does however have its good moments so ill leave the review at that.
Track List :1. Sudden Death
2. Public Enemy No. 1
3. Whose Life (Is It Anyways?)
4. We the People
5. Guns, Drugs & Money
6. Never Dead
7. New World Order
8. Fast Lane
9. Black Swan
10. Wrecker
11. Millennium of the Blind
12. Deadly Nightshade
13. 13
![Adfly](<!-- Start of adf.ly banner code --> <div style="width: 728px; text-align: center; font-family: verdana; font-size: 10px;"><a href="https://join-adf.ly/25032027"><img border="0" src="https://cdn.adf.ly/images/banners/adfly.728x90.2.gif" width="728" height="90" title="AdF.ly - shorten links and earn money!" /></a><br /><a href="https://join-adf.ly/25032027">Get paid to share your links!</a></div> <!-- End of adf.ly banner code -->)