METALLICA Drummer A Big Fan Of 'Guitar Hero'

The Pulse of Radio reports: When Guitar Hero: World Tour arrives at the end of this month, METALLICA fans will be able to play all 10 songs from the band's new album, "Death Magnetic", on the game as downloadable content. Among those playing along will be METALLICA drummer Lars Ulrich, who bought the game for his kids and told The Pulse of Radio why he's now a fan himself. "It works on a couple of fronts," he said. "It works on the front of sharing the experiences with your kids. It works on exposing your kids to music. And it also helps Dad a little bit, because all of a sudden Dad's in the video game, and that helps balance the perception of Dad when Dad spends a lot of time talking about doing homework and eating vegetables and all this other stuff, you know what I mean?"

Guitar Hero: World Tour is due out on October 26. It contains more than 80 songs from METALLICA, VAN HALEN, MICHAEL JACKSON, OZZY OSBOURNE, THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND, COLDPLAY, STING, and dozens more artists.

METALLICA also created a special "extended" version of a "Death Magnetic" track called "Suicide and Redemption" for playing on Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock. All 10 songs from "Death Magnetic" are available as downloadable content for Guitar Hero III.

While a rumored all-METALLICA edition of Guitar Hero has yet to be confirmed by either the band or the game's publisher, Lars Ulrich himself hinted that the game will be out sometime next year.

"Death Magnetic" has sold more than one million copies since being released on September 12. It sits at No. 5 on this week's Billboard chart.

METALLICA will kick off its first indoor North American tour on October 21 in Glendale, Arizona. Ulrich told Billboard that the band intends to play at least five new songs a night in its set, rotating them so that all the tracks from "Death Magnetic" will be performed live.