There is something timelessly “metal” about Metallica’s sound that draws in new fans, mostly teens, every year. Their influence is one of the biggest in heavy music and their ability to open up the doors of metal to mainstream listeners paved the way for many hundreds of successful bands.

Here are five of their best moments.

Ride The Lightning (1984)

THEIR debut Kill ‘Em All bolted Metallica out of the gates with a relentless barrage of flat-out riffs and aggression, helping kick-start their careers and the thrash metal scene in one fast and furious swoop. But it was with Ride The Lightning that the quartet really signalled they had arrived. After lulling you into thinking they’ve gone soft with a classical guitar intro, Metallica shows they haven’t totally slowed done with the off-kilter pace of Fight Fire With Fire. It’s the ambition of this album that makes it a metal classic – the songs go off in prog-rock and operatic directions but without losing intensity, resulting in highlights such as the apocalyptic epic Creeping Death and mind-blowing instrumental closer The Call Of Ktulu (which features some fireworks from lead guitarist Kirk Hammett). Elsewhere, Escape hints at hair-metal, For Whom The Bell Tolls points toward the heavier end of grunge, and Fade To Black is their first power ballad.

Master Of Puppets (1986)

THIS would be the last album the band would record with bassist Cliff Burton. Six months after its release, Burton was killed when their tour bus skidded off an icy road in Sweden. The record has gone a long way towards preserving Burton’s legacy – Master Of Puppets is regularly regarded as not only Metallica’s finest hour but one of the greatest metal albums ever. The record’s side A – rampaging opener Battery, the elaborately epic title track, the haunting surge and chug of The Thing That Should Not Be, and slow-burning gloom-rock of Welcome Home (Sanitarium) – is as good as any side of vinyl released in the ‘80s. An intelligent match of melody and rhythm, power and potency, and hard-riffing and masturbatory guitar work helped make this the first thrash metal album to crack the top 40 in the US.

…And Justice For All (1988)

FOR many fans, the death of Cliff Burton was the end of Metallica. But for many more, this was the album that grabbed them. The record went top 10 in the US and UK, while the beguiling and unlikely second single One – the troubling tale of a soldier left deaf, blind, mute and paralysed after stepping on a land mine – scored the band their first top 40 single hit and its first Grammy, as well as an MTV hit with it’s mesmerising film clip. The album was their biggest to date and boasted grinding classics Eye Of The Beholder and Harvester Of Sorrow, but in retrospect has been criticised for its thin sound. The lack of bass in the mix has been attributed to the band’s ‘hazing’ of new bassist Jason Newsted and even members of Metallica have said they would like to remix the album and beef up the bass.

Metallica (The Black Album) (1991)

HERE it is – the biggest heavy metal album in history (it’s apparently the 25th biggest selling record of all time). The reason is killer singles that slithered along like seemingly harmless rock songs yet thrashed like an angry serpent in the right places. The opening tracks - smash hit Enter Sandman and the stomping Sad But True - are perfect examples of Metallica’s crossover skills, where a pop structure is ambushed by an army of marching riffs in heavy metal armour. Love ballad Nothing Else Matters continued the thread of quieter moment begun with Fade To Black, but without the expected rock out, which annoyed some fans but in hindsight can be seen as a bold move to break out of their thrashy restrictions. Along with the operatic opus The Unforgiven (which cleverly reverses the quiet verse-loud chorus dynamic), The Black Album showed that a decade into their career, Metallica were still vital, ambitious and willing to break the rules they had helped set for metal bands.

Load (1996)/ReLoad (1997)

AFTER the longest hiatus of their careers, Metallica released what is effectively a double album spread out over two years. More bluesy and swaggering than thrashy and aggressive, this was two-discs-worth of a band trying to keep moving and remain fresh (as evidenced by the short haircuts) yet somehow wandering aimlessly. You can’t help but think there’s a single kick-arse disc amid the staggering two-and-a-half hours of music here. Load’s gothic single Until It Sleeps, the cathartic epic Bleeding Me, and the beautiful country-rocker Mama Said, when mixed with ReLoad’s punk-metal opener Fuel, the weighty The Memory Remains and the powerful The Unforgiven II, would make for the basis of a truly awesome Metallica album.