METALLICA 30th-Anniversary Celebration Discussed In Latest 'Shockwaves Skull Sessions' Podcast

Shockwaves Skull Sessions episode #54 is the METALLICA 30th-anniversary podcast covering the band's four shows at the Fillmore in San Francisco as part of the week-long celebration for fan club members only. The episode includes two separate discussions, the first featuring Ron Quintana, Patrick Scott and Tobe Baad along with host Bob Nalbandian; and the second with Steffan Chirazi and John Kornarens joining Nalbandian.

METALLICA drummer Lars Ulrich has told Rolling Stone that the band is "seven, eight songs" into the writing of its next album. Ulrich explained, "We do it in rounds. We come up with something, we leave it, go to the next thing, come up with something basic, leave it and circle back around." Guitarist Kirk Hammett added, "The stuff we're coming up with is more groove-oriented — a heavier version of what we were doing in the early '90s. If (2008 album) 'Death Magnetic' was a logical successor to (1988's) '...And Justice For All', the next album will be a heavier 'black album.' We're not going to the depths of complexity that we did for 'Death Magnetic'."

Ulrich added that the songs on the new disc — which will be produced once again by Rick Rubin — will be "shorter, more to-the-point."

Bassist Robert Trujillo told The Pulse Of Radio a while back that he thought "Death Magnetic" paved the way for an even better next effort. "I have a feeling that this next record is gonna be really cool," he said. "'Death Magnetic', as great as it is, I think it's, to me it was like establishing ourselves as a creative team with this unit, and you know, also reuniting with that thrashy element which is apparent in a lot of the material."

METALLICA will play the "black album" — its 1991 self-titled fifth effort that has sold nearly 16 million copies — in its entirety at selected European festivals this summer.

As for another project — the recently announced 3D METALLICA movie — Ulrich shed some light on what the band has in mind. He said, "Imagine if you took (LED ZEPPELIN's (concert film) 'The Song Remains The Same', which is 75 percent concert, 25 percent other stuff, and flipped it around. And all the non-concert footage, instead of being about the band members, is a story that unfolds, set against the backdrop of the concert."

METALLICA's four-song EP called "Beyond Magnetic", which was made available digitally last month, will be released as a physical CD on January 31 (one day earlier internationally). The effort consists of the quartet of previously unheard tracks that the band unveiled in concert last month during its 30th-anniversary celebration. All four tunes — "Hate Train", "Just A Bullet Away", "Hell And Back" and "Rebel Of Babylon" — were recorded during the sessions for the band's 2008 "Death Magnetic" album but left off the final track list.