…the “St.Anger” era kicked off on April 30th/May 1st with the small matter of a video shoot at San Quentin prison for the same-titled track, and continued in earnest with an MTV Icons tribute show a week later, where peers such as Korn and Limp Bizkit lined up to pay tribute to the chaps. The guys also performed live, marking the first ‘official’ live appearance of Robert Trujillo (and the last in which he wore long trousers!) as well as James Hetfield’s first public performance since his stint in rehab.
Then came the small matter of rehearsals…which Metallica chose to do in front of their loyal fan club members over 4 nights at the historic Fillmore Theatre in San Francisco…and then it was off to Europe in June for the start of what would end up being 19 months of touring, with the festival circuit taking the early brunt, Metallica successfully playing to multiple 60,000-plus crowds. “St.Anger” saw it’s release on June 5th, a raw, feral, unrestrained slab of molten Metallica stuffed with abrasion, aggression and the overspill of four years excitement, anger, frustration and ultimate fruition. For those who thought it would signal a radio-hohned band, “St.Anger” was a big, fat slap in the face. Indeed, it was actually too heavy for some! Oh, and as if to prove that this ‘new’ Metallica were not a bunch of ginger-snap panty-waists, the boys played three shows in three different Parisian clubs in one day during mid-June, each venue harboring a temperature of not less than 100 degrees.
In the US, Summer Sanitarium followed, with Linkin Park and Limp Bizkit amongst the support acts on another series of stadium sell-outs. In the meanwhile, the fervor was slowly building for ‘Some Kind Of Monster’, the documentary film by Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky about the world of Metallica between 2001 and 2003. Ostensibly slated to be about the making of an album, the filmmakers found a whole new project developing when James went into rehab, and thus having been projected as a marketing tool, the end product ended up being an incredibly revealing 2 hour 20 minute documentary.
As the Mighty Metallica continued ploughing on through the world (going back to Europe, Japan and then onto Australia in January), SKOM was debuted to enormous critical acclaim at the 2004 Sundance Independent Film Festival in Utah during January.
And the year continued in the way that you’d imagine a Metalli-year does, deciding to play (seemingly) every single town capable of hosting a major arena gig in North America (some 80-plus dates) with Godsmack in support. Result? Oh well, the usual sell-outs you’d expect for this ‘in-the-round’ two hour thirty minute set which saw no song off limits and many a fan favorite raised from retirement for a gleeful airing. (p.s….there was another Grammy in February for Best Metal Performance – ‘St.Anger’).
July saw the theatrical debut of ‘Some Kind Of Monster’ which opened to enormous critical acclaim and went on to hold it’s own in North American theaters for three months before going through Europe. And August also saw the release of the first official Metallica book, “So What! The Good, the Mad, and the Ugly”, an edited compilation of the band’s fan club magazine spanning 10 years from 1994 to 2004.
And still the ‘Madly In Anger With The World’ tour continued, selling out venues right through to it’s final date in San Jose, California on November 29, 2004…
A busy spell? By many’s standards most certainly.
By Metallica’s?
Business as usual.
They did publicly state that the majority of 2005 would be spent re-charging those creative and mental batteries, and true to their word it was a quiet year, except for two little hometown gigs with the Rolling Stones at SBC Park in November. We all knew an entire year would not pass without at least a sighting of the guys!
With batteries re-charged after the two shows with the Stones, the guys hit the studio in early 2006 to start writing a new album and were excited to announce that they would be working with a new producer, Rick Rubin. The spring and summer found them escaping from the studio once again with shows in South Africa (their first ever visit to the continent!), Europe, Japan and Korea. “The New Song” made its debut in Berlin, Germany on June 6 to give us all a little taste of things to come in 2007 with the remainder of the year scheduled for more writing and jamming.
Before they had even played 'The New Song' on that 07 summer jaunt, Metallica had decided to take a different approach to the studio, now working with Rubin. Having availed themselves of long-time twiddler Bob Rock's expertise and unifying qualities, the band wanted to see what happened when working with the decidedly hands-off Rubin. His message, when the band entered the studio in April of 07 to record, was simple; don't be afraid of your past, don't be afraid to rediscover your roots, embrace the ethic of performance over editing and get back to what Metallica essentially is. Thus began months of work with hands-on engineer Greg Fidelman handing the daily duties and Rubin overseeing and dropping in for tete-a-tetes to make sure matters remained on course. In essence, Rubin removed himself from the process as an ally to anyone and forced Metallica to find their own solutions and resolutions. He also made everyone re-record entire parts if they were unhappy to avoid a pro-tools dominated approach to creation, the idea being that it was always about the performance. Ironically, Rubin would later comment in the band's magazine So What! that the bulk of the album was recorded in a month, despite the fact it finally saw light on September 12, 2008, celebrating the release with two low ticket cost charity shows in Berlin and at London's O2 Arena.
The popular response was enormous, with the album smashing the charts at #1 and critical acclaim acknowledging that this was, indeed, the return to business that Metallica had threatened for so long. The groundwork had been laid with St.Anger and the fruit was abundant with Death Magnetic, cuts such as "The Day That Never Comes", "Broken, Beat & Scarred" and "All Nightmare Long" becoming instant fan favorites. Aside from the Death Magnetic album, on March 29, 2009 the band also saw Guitar Hero: Metallica released in North America, with international releases coming in the following couple of months. An Activision game, GH:M features 28 Metallica favorites and 21 songs from bands Metallica like, as well as guest appearances from King Diamond and Lemmy from Motorhead.
As well as all these releases, the band of course hit the road, the World Magnetic Tour starting on October 20, 2008 in Glendale, Arizona. It is a tour that keeps on giving, keeps on coming, and will flow deep into 2010, the band hoping to perhaps play in some places they've never been before. Gone, however, are the grueling days of 8-10 weeks at a time on the asphalt, instead the schedule ensures Metallica are never on the road for longer than a couple of weeks before taking at least a week off back at home. It is a highly effective solution to the problem of making the road work with family and home life, and as such the tour thus far has seen some of Metallica's best performances ever as 'burn-out' is not even a factor. Indeed, with shows selling out left, right, centre and sideways, an appearance at the legendary British site Knebworth on August 2nd as part of the Sonisphere Festival, plus three sold-out nights in Mexico City, it is fair to say that this portion of the story is most certainly to be continued...
source
Then came the small matter of rehearsals…which Metallica chose to do in front of their loyal fan club members over 4 nights at the historic Fillmore Theatre in San Francisco…and then it was off to Europe in June for the start of what would end up being 19 months of touring, with the festival circuit taking the early brunt, Metallica successfully playing to multiple 60,000-plus crowds. “St.Anger” saw it’s release on June 5th, a raw, feral, unrestrained slab of molten Metallica stuffed with abrasion, aggression and the overspill of four years excitement, anger, frustration and ultimate fruition. For those who thought it would signal a radio-hohned band, “St.Anger” was a big, fat slap in the face. Indeed, it was actually too heavy for some! Oh, and as if to prove that this ‘new’ Metallica were not a bunch of ginger-snap panty-waists, the boys played three shows in three different Parisian clubs in one day during mid-June, each venue harboring a temperature of not less than 100 degrees.
In the US, Summer Sanitarium followed, with Linkin Park and Limp Bizkit amongst the support acts on another series of stadium sell-outs. In the meanwhile, the fervor was slowly building for ‘Some Kind Of Monster’, the documentary film by Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky about the world of Metallica between 2001 and 2003. Ostensibly slated to be about the making of an album, the filmmakers found a whole new project developing when James went into rehab, and thus having been projected as a marketing tool, the end product ended up being an incredibly revealing 2 hour 20 minute documentary.
As the Mighty Metallica continued ploughing on through the world (going back to Europe, Japan and then onto Australia in January), SKOM was debuted to enormous critical acclaim at the 2004 Sundance Independent Film Festival in Utah during January.
And the year continued in the way that you’d imagine a Metalli-year does, deciding to play (seemingly) every single town capable of hosting a major arena gig in North America (some 80-plus dates) with Godsmack in support. Result? Oh well, the usual sell-outs you’d expect for this ‘in-the-round’ two hour thirty minute set which saw no song off limits and many a fan favorite raised from retirement for a gleeful airing. (p.s….there was another Grammy in February for Best Metal Performance – ‘St.Anger’).
July saw the theatrical debut of ‘Some Kind Of Monster’ which opened to enormous critical acclaim and went on to hold it’s own in North American theaters for three months before going through Europe. And August also saw the release of the first official Metallica book, “So What! The Good, the Mad, and the Ugly”, an edited compilation of the band’s fan club magazine spanning 10 years from 1994 to 2004.
And still the ‘Madly In Anger With The World’ tour continued, selling out venues right through to it’s final date in San Jose, California on November 29, 2004…
A busy spell? By many’s standards most certainly.
By Metallica’s?
Business as usual.
They did publicly state that the majority of 2005 would be spent re-charging those creative and mental batteries, and true to their word it was a quiet year, except for two little hometown gigs with the Rolling Stones at SBC Park in November. We all knew an entire year would not pass without at least a sighting of the guys!
With batteries re-charged after the two shows with the Stones, the guys hit the studio in early 2006 to start writing a new album and were excited to announce that they would be working with a new producer, Rick Rubin. The spring and summer found them escaping from the studio once again with shows in South Africa (their first ever visit to the continent!), Europe, Japan and Korea. “The New Song” made its debut in Berlin, Germany on June 6 to give us all a little taste of things to come in 2007 with the remainder of the year scheduled for more writing and jamming.
Before they had even played 'The New Song' on that 07 summer jaunt, Metallica had decided to take a different approach to the studio, now working with Rubin. Having availed themselves of long-time twiddler Bob Rock's expertise and unifying qualities, the band wanted to see what happened when working with the decidedly hands-off Rubin. His message, when the band entered the studio in April of 07 to record, was simple; don't be afraid of your past, don't be afraid to rediscover your roots, embrace the ethic of performance over editing and get back to what Metallica essentially is. Thus began months of work with hands-on engineer Greg Fidelman handing the daily duties and Rubin overseeing and dropping in for tete-a-tetes to make sure matters remained on course. In essence, Rubin removed himself from the process as an ally to anyone and forced Metallica to find their own solutions and resolutions. He also made everyone re-record entire parts if they were unhappy to avoid a pro-tools dominated approach to creation, the idea being that it was always about the performance. Ironically, Rubin would later comment in the band's magazine So What! that the bulk of the album was recorded in a month, despite the fact it finally saw light on September 12, 2008, celebrating the release with two low ticket cost charity shows in Berlin and at London's O2 Arena.
The popular response was enormous, with the album smashing the charts at #1 and critical acclaim acknowledging that this was, indeed, the return to business that Metallica had threatened for so long. The groundwork had been laid with St.Anger and the fruit was abundant with Death Magnetic, cuts such as "The Day That Never Comes", "Broken, Beat & Scarred" and "All Nightmare Long" becoming instant fan favorites. Aside from the Death Magnetic album, on March 29, 2009 the band also saw Guitar Hero: Metallica released in North America, with international releases coming in the following couple of months. An Activision game, GH:M features 28 Metallica favorites and 21 songs from bands Metallica like, as well as guest appearances from King Diamond and Lemmy from Motorhead.
As well as all these releases, the band of course hit the road, the World Magnetic Tour starting on October 20, 2008 in Glendale, Arizona. It is a tour that keeps on giving, keeps on coming, and will flow deep into 2010, the band hoping to perhaps play in some places they've never been before. Gone, however, are the grueling days of 8-10 weeks at a time on the asphalt, instead the schedule ensures Metallica are never on the road for longer than a couple of weeks before taking at least a week off back at home. It is a highly effective solution to the problem of making the road work with family and home life, and as such the tour thus far has seen some of Metallica's best performances ever as 'burn-out' is not even a factor. Indeed, with shows selling out left, right, centre and sideways, an appearance at the legendary British site Knebworth on August 2nd as part of the Sonisphere Festival, plus three sold-out nights in Mexico City, it is fair to say that this portion of the story is most certainly to be continued...
source
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