End of Days is a classic "Music from and Inspired by the Motion Picture" album. It doesn't really matter whether songs are in the movie or not, since the goal of the record is to sell Arnold Schwarzenegger's comeback film to an audience of alt-metal fans that were in elementary school when he made his last really "cool" picture, 1991's Terminator 2: Judgment Day. So, it's loaded with new music from Korn, Everlast, Limp Bizkit, and Eminem -- aggressive adolescent sensations from 1998 and 1999 who are so big that new music from any of them guarantees the attention of young males, thereby creating audience awareness of End of the Days. On top of that, there's previously released material from Powerman 5000, Creed, and Rob Zombie (technically, "Superbeast" is a new remix, but it's an old song), plus introductory songs from forthcoming Geffen/Interscope acts Professional Murder Music and Stroke. There are also oldies from Prodigy and Sonic Youth; these may be the two best songs on the record, but they feel out of place and alongside all of the alt-metal on the record. They don't necessarily sound dated, however; since the rest of the album feels dated so much of the time, it's already a strange period piece. And that doesn't necessarily mean that the music is bad, either, although there are several throwaway cuts here. Powerman 5000 and Professional Murder Music fail to distinguish themselves, but their contributions are fairly good alt-metal genre pieces. Creed's "Wrong Way" re-confirms how traditionalist their grunge is, while Rob Zombie's "Superbeast" neither improves nor diminishes the original -- it's just there. Stroke's "I Wish I Had," about the lightest thing here, has some promise with their blend of post-grunge hard rock and vague techno underpinnings. As one of their straightest rap cuts yet, Limp Bizkit's "Crushed" is just lame, proving that the band has no funk and that Fred Durst has a thin, weak voice and can't really rap. Eminem's "Bad Influence" highlights the problems with "Crushed," actually, since the rhythms are a lot tougher, and unlike Durst, Eminem has true vocal style and verbal dexterity, which is obvious even if you don't get with his sense of humor. Korn's gifts are also apparent on "Camel Song," a (surprise!) Mid-eastern-flavored dirge which proves that they have more visceral power and mastery over dynamics than their contemporaries. Also on the positive side, Everlast continues to surprise with "So Long"; among the darkest and best things he's recorded, this is a tale about an adolescent's life gone violently wrong. So, overall, End of Days delivers what it promises, and even if a couple cuts are a little under par, it still effectively appeals to the aggro-metal demographic that Schwarzengger needs if he's going to rule the action roost again.

Oh, but you can't forget about the other big comeback on End of Days: the return of Guns N' Roses, or more specifically, the return of Axl Rose. GNR had been missing in action pretty much since the release of their 1991 magnum opus, double-album set Use Your Illusion. Sure, The Spaghetti Incident? was released in 1993, but that was largely comprised of leftovers. The last thing GNR recorded, strangely enough, was for another high-profile soundtrack, 1994's Interview With the Vampire, where Axl rearranged and pretty much ruined "Sympathy for the Devil," and that's all anybody heard from him for five years. Each year, a member dropped out of GNR, culminating in Slash's departure in 1997 or so. Rumors persisted that Rose was heavily into industrial music, which was the reason why all the founding members were driven out the band -- after all, they were just hard rockers who really couldn't be bothered with computers or trying to sound contemporary. Rose drafted a number of musicians, including Dave Navarro, Tommy Stinson, and former Nine Inch Nails guitarist Robin Finck, for informal jam sessions, but nothing materialized until "Oh My God," their featured song on End of Days. Some of the rumors proved to be true -- Navarro plays on the song, which is heavily influenced by industrial rock. Actually, apart from Axl's vocals and the intro -- which sounds vaguely like a darker version of the "Sweet Child o Mine" intro, but played on keyboards -- "Oh My God" doesn't really sound like GNR. The problem is, Rose also doesn't sound like an innovator here; he just sounds like he's catching up to where Nine Inch Nails and Ministry were in 1994, the very year Rose faded into seclusion. And that's the major flaw in "Oh My God" -- it's clearly the work of an artist in seclusion, piecing together something he think sounds hip and happening. Rose has overloaded the track with processed guitars (so much so that it's impossible to tell whether Navarro's guitar is even on the cut) and distorted vocals, things alt-metal had left behind by 1999, as every other track (apart, of course, from the oldies) on End of Days proves. However, the song doesn't really sound like an industrial-metal track, since it's structured like a typical GNR song. Consequently, it seems weirdly out of time -- something that will not appeal to longtime GNR fans, nor to the young fans of late-'90s alt-metal, since it feels curiously dated. Perhaps "Oh My God" wouldn't have sounded as out-of-place if it had appeared in 1995 or 1996, but as it stands, it's a less than satisfying comeback -- and one that proves just how out-of-step and isolated Rose was from nearly every progression in hard rock and metal in the years after Nirvana. [End of Days was also released in a "clean" version, containing no vulgarities or profanities.] ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide