This report was filed by Bob Mulhouse who got to hear six tracks of the new Metallica album. Here is an excerpt of what he had to say about it:
 
"Right from the off, it's a relief to hear that the utterly awful production of 'St. Anger' is no more. [Lars] Ulrich has replaced the old dustbin lid from that album with an actual snare drum, and the sound is fresh, clean and resonant (even though the songs are still only rough mixes at this stage). The first song, like the rest of the 'epics,' is between six and eight minutes long and begins with a bass intro from low-ender extraordinaire Robert Trujillo. Moving rapidly from riff to riff, the song bursts with energy and ideas: singer and rhythm guitarist James Hetfield barks 'Luck runs out!' repeatedly and throws in some twisty, semi-progressive riffs which could have been lifted directly from, their last truly good album, 1988's '…And Justice For All'. Guitarist Kirk Hammett, who was banned from soloing on 'St. Anguish' for no adequately explored reason, is on fire, whipping out the melodic, rapid-fire shreds for which he is famous over an extended solo section — almost as if he's making up for lost time. This is Metallica's best song in ages, perhaps since the 1980s.

"The next song has a working title of 'Flamingo' and is going to be the first single. Now, Metallica's lead singles have been breathtakingly crap since 1995, so it was a relief to hear that 'Flamingo' (as it almost definitely will not be called) is a modernised take on their amazing 1988 song 'One', all balladry at its front end before a speeded-up metalstorm at the back. Hetfield delivers a clean-picked intro which reminded me of the Beach Boys (I know… but I only got to hear it once, all right?) before the body of the song, which is basically like 'The Unforgiven' from 1991's 'Black Album'. If you're familiar with the chord progression behind the solo in 'Am I Evil?', the ancient Diamond Head song which Metallica made their own, you'll be able to picture the under-solo riffage in this song — all simple, effective major-interval jumps.

"However, let us not forget that this is modern Metallica— and the next two songs are much less fun. The first, which may be called 'We Die Hard' judging by the frequency with which Hetfield barks the phrase, starts boringly but accelerates halfway through and enters slightly proggy territory, all stop-start riff stabs and a clever time signature. The next song is very '…And Justice', a lengthy, unhurried workout which revolves around the line 'Bow down / Sell your soul to me / I will set you free,' itself a 1988 line if I ever heard one. Apart from dexterous soloing from Hammett, it's not great."
 
So it sounds like one or two good songs and the rest filler, mediocre crap we have come to expect from Metallica.
 
By the way, I am tired of the "it has to be over 6 minutes" for the Metallica song to be good. Sure there were some awesome Metallica epics (Ride the Lightning, One, Master of Puppets) but there were some great Metallica songs that were less than 6 minutes (Whiplash, Motorbreath, Damage Inc, Battery, Leper Messiah). There is no reason to have an over 6 minute song, if all you have is 4 minutes worth of good stuff.
 
Before St. Anger was released one of the selling points was the songs were going to be a "return to the old Metallica epics" in length. That would mark a divergence from the Load, Reload albums where a majority of the songs (see singles) that were under this magical 6 minute mark.
 
Then St. Anger is released and you get songs like Some Kind of Monster which is a 4 minute song repeated twice. Actually, the entire St. Anger album would have been better had the songs been cut in half.