METALLICA's JAMES HETFIELD: 'Music Is Therapy For Me'

January 4, 2017

Germany's Bild magazine conducted an interview with METALLICA frontman James Hetfield on November 17 in Berlin. You can now watch the chat below. A couple of excerpts follow (transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET).

On what keeps METALLICA motivated to keep playing music and touring the world:

James: "We are four individuals with four very different approaches to life and philosophies and everything. We have our own families, we have our own lives, but when we get together, we know that, uh, gosh, METALLICA is a really important part of our lives and other people's lives. We need to care for it. We take care of METALLICA is what we need to do. And if someone is not feeling particularly inspired, then the three others step up and we get it done and then they eventually show up again. So it's a family… It's happy and sad and everything. I mean, it's brutal. There's tension, there's love, there's hate, there's all of that. Yeah, it's a family of brothers."

On the lyrical themes covered on METALLICA's latest album, "Hardwired… To Self-Destruct":

James: "There are times when I'm happy; there are times when I'm not as happy. I think I'm a human most of the time. Music is therapy for me. I get to write lyrics, I get to get crazy thoughts out of my head and onto paper, and other people read them and say, 'Wow! I understand that.' So it makes me feel okay. I'm looking to feel okay most of the time. But it's a cynical view, I would say, most of this record, on mankind. Who do you think you are, you know? Being on the planet this long [brings two fingers close together] out of the history of the universe, do you think you have any control over what's happening in the world or in the planet? So I guess there's a very pessimistic look, but at the end… I always start pessimistic and end up optimistic somehow. [Laughs]"

"Hardwired… To Self-Destruct" debuted at No. 1 on The Billboard 200 album chart, selling 291,000 copies in its first week of release. The effort consists of two discs, containing a dozen songs and nearly 80 minutes of music.

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