Metallica's new record Death Magnetic set to go No.1
AMID the release of their ninth studio album, Metallica drummer Lars Ulrich is making some incredulous, downright outrageous claims.
Ulrich, who might have been a professional tennis player had he not picked up the drumsticks, is calling his membership in one of the world's most legendary metal rock bands a hobby.
The drummer, enroute to another interview in Paris, insists his reality mirrors that of any suburban father.
This is scandalous talk on the eve of the release of the band's much anticipated ninth studio record, Death Magnetic.
How in Satan's name could Ulrich, a man who seemingly sold his soul for rock'n'roll and has indulged its hedonistic pleasures, suggest he is just like every other fortysomething bloke on the planet.
"We all live quiet normal lives in the suburbs outside San Francisco, taking our kids to school," he says, chuckling.
"My responsibilities are to wake up at 6.30 in the morning and make the lunch boxes.
"Hanging out in Paris doing TV shows and having nice fancy dinners and drinking expensive French wine, it's not exactly hard work.
"I tell the people with me that they have permission to slap me if I ever complain.
"None of them slap me enough because they are scared but I do encourage them."
So Ulrich is living every adult male's dream - he gets to run away from home to join the metal circus.
He readily agrees that Metallica is now the "fun part" of his life.
"I look increasingly at Metallica as my escape away from my real responsibilities which are my kids and family and my domestic situation," Ulrich says.
"A lot of people use the word job or work, but this is fun, it's an escape to go away on tour.
"I get more sleep on tour than when I am at home."
The drummer, his band cofounder frontman James Hetfield, guitarist Kirk Hammett and bassist Robert Trujillo are currently spread throughout Europe, filling their days with chatfests about Death Magnetic.
Their nights belong to the stage where they remain the kings of the epic rock performance to the legion of Metallica fans who have maintained their faith through less-than-stellar musical offerings and that confounding therapy session made public by the documentary Some Kind Of Monster.
But the title alone of their ninth record suggests some issues remain unresolved, at least for frontman Hetfield, who underwent nine months of rehabilitation for alcoholism and other addictions before the band recorded their 2003 album St Anger.
Death Magnetic's themes are classic metal lore with Hetfield suggesting he was originally inspired by "rock'n'roll martyrs" including Alice In Chains' Layne Staley.
In the end, Hetfield's lyrics run the gamut of mortality and as Ulrich agrees, it isn't the most uplifting of records.
But it is cathartic, as evidenced by the worshipful and energetic reaction of European fans to the new material on the band's current tour.
"It's not the most cheery of records," Ulrich says.
"There's a thread going through all the songs, through death and suicide, despair and misery and f***edupness.
"Death Magnetic was a way, an expression of summing all that up.
"The lyrics are always important to Metallica. They can't be forced and these ones came out quite late in the process, all from the twisted mind of one James Hetfield."
Ulrich said Hetfield worked in isolation on the words. The drummer was stunned when he heard the results.
"I was stunned at how great the lyrics were. And stunned how much s*** was going on in his head, how many issues are lingering in the poor man's head.
"So I was pleased from the creative viewpoint but a little concerned about the guy."
While Some Kind Of Monster showed Hetfield and Ulrich in a constant tug of war for control of the band they formed in 1981, an unlikely outsider was responsible for kickstarting Death Magnetic.
When I ask Ulrich who made the first call to get Metallica back in the studio, he laughs and pauses for effect before he drops the unexpected name.
"Mick Jagger. And I'll tell you why it was Mick Jagger. One of his reps called up Metallica's reps in the fall of 2005 and asked if we would play with the Rolling Stones in San Francisco," Ulrich explains.
"Our response was 'Fine, f*** it, we'll play with the Stones because it's something everyone should do once'.
"We met up a week before the shows after the better part of a year off and started rehearsing and hanging out.
"We had such a good time that literally the day after the Stones show, we went in and started going through the demo tapes."
The band members spent two months sorting through more than 25 hours worth of musical ideas from guitar riffs to drum patterns.
"It requires great patience but listen, it's a good thing to have a lot of stuff to go through and it's also a good thing to have the luxury of time.
"It's good to not be stressed or be forced by a record company to go make a record at a particular time."
Curiosity about Metallica's future intensified when they revealed mythic producer Rick Rubin would helm the recording sessions.
Rubin insisted the band not enter the studio until they had the songs perfected by playing them over and over again together.
But the sessions weren't all day and night affairs. When Hetfield rejoined the band in 2001 after rehabilitation, he would work four hour sessions so he could devote more time to his family.
That modus operandi continued in the studio for Death Magnetic - all the band members have children now - but Ulrich says that was as much due to the physical exertion required to play live for four hours.
The have a massage therapist on hand for between song rubdowns during your average two-and-a-half-hour Metallica concert so you an imagine how exhausted they are after four hours of playing, even with some very un-rock preparation.
"When you are trying to nail something in the studio, you have to bring an extra physicality because of the lack of an audience; you have to find it yourself, turn it up not just to 11 but to 12," Ulrich says.
"We don't do many takes - six, eight, maybe 10 and then we are done with it and you usually get three or four hours out of us at that level.
"There's definitely a routine for us in the studio and it also involves having a steam and yoga and fruit plates."
Of course all that happens behind closed doors and best it stays there so metal fans can remain blissfully oblivious to such gentle behaviour.
There is no doubt their regime and Rubin's guru-like guidance paid off with Death Magnetic being universally proclaimed a return to form.
It debuted at No.6 on the ARIA charts after just one day of sales, guaranteeing it will rocket to No.1 on Monday.
The album's first two singles The Day That Never Comes and Cyanide have made it onto the singles charts, a remarkable achievement when you consider they are each more than six-and-a-half minutes long.
Ulrich is understandably proud that a Metallica release has become such an event that radio bosses would air epic rock songs which stretch the under-four-minute attention span of the average listener.
"That is a victory. There's a lot of love and goodwill and positive momentum for this Metallica record," he says.
"Let's see in six months whether it sticks."
Death Magnetic out now. Metallica will tour Australia in 2009.
