KIRK HAMMETT Says Some Of His Ideas Get Shot Down By METALLICA's 'Tone Police'

November 1, 2019

METALLICA's Kirk Hammett has lamented the fact that his bandmates aren't receptive to some of his outside musical influences.

The guitarist revealed his frustration during a conversation with Annie Clark, a.k.a. St. Vincent, as part of Rolling Stone magazine's "Musicians On Musicians" issue.

"I always feel like I have so much more to say on [each] album, but I can't say it," Hammett said. "It's crazy, because I'm so curious about music in general. I can play a lot of different stuff. I'll play some jazz, bossa nova, blues, gypsy jazz, fucking Eastern European ballads. I play all that stuff. But no one knows I can play this stuff. It's so crazy. I'm always trying to sneak in jazz voicings and chords, little techniques here and there in METALLICA."

When Clark asked Hammett whether he gets shot down by the rest of METALLICA, Hammett responded: "All the time. 'That sounds too bluesy.' And I'm, like, 'Fucking hell, it's just a slide. All right, whatever, tone police.' But you need tone police. Tone is super-important."

Hammett recently said that he has already accumulated "a lot" of "kick-ass, great" ideas for METALLICA's next album.

The METALLICA guitarist famously lost his iPhone containing hundreds of riffs in 2014. About six months later, he told "The Jasta Show" podcast that he "was crushed" when it happened, but still expressed hope that it "might turn up."

Hammett is not credited on any of the songs on 2016's "Hardwired…To Self-Destruct" album.

METALLICA frontman James Hetfield told Metal XS in 2016 that "Kirk's riffs weren't there" when it was time to write the music for the follow-up to 2008's "Death Magnetic" record. Hetfield also told U.K. radio station Planet Rock that Kirk "was not present in the studio" while METALLICA was working on "Hardwired… To Self-Destruct". "He was dealing with life," James said.

"Hardwired… To Self-Destruct" debuted at No. 1 on The Billboard 200 album chart, selling 291,000 copies in its first week of release.

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