METALLICA's ROBERT TRUJILLO On Band's New Music: 'What We're Doing Sounds Heavy'

In a brand new interview with Rolling Stone, METALLICA bassist Robert Trujillo spoke about the progress of the songwriting sessions for the follow-up to 2008's "Death Magnetic". He said: "We're working on these songs and we're having a blast. We are being productive and having fun.

Asked if the new material feels like an extension of "Death Magnetic", Trujillo said: "I can't say that yet. I really can't relate it to any album; I think every METALLICA album is unique in its own way. What we're doing is special and unique in its own way, but still keeping it heavy."

He continued: "For me as a listener, part of the journey I'm on with METALLICA, there's just a certain edge that needs to be there.

"Before I even joined METALLICA, I used to train for tours, when I was in SUICIDAL TENDENCIES, to 'Ride The Lightning'. There's nothing like jogging the trails to, like, 'Fight Fire With Fire'."

Trujillo added: "I can tell you that what we're doing sounds heavy, but again each album is its own little experience. So we'll just have to wait and see."

METALLICA drummer Lars Ulrich recently told Rolling Stone that the band has written close to 20 new songs for its long-awaited tenth studio album, and will get closer to entering the studio in the near future. Ulrich said, "We've got lots of songs, and we're honing them and tweaking them. It's pretty close."

He continued, "In our world, there's been a distinct difference between the creative phase and the recording phase. With this project, we're trying to bridge the two a little more organically and not have there be such a great divide between the processes. We want to see if we can bring some of the creative curiosity, the impulsive stuff that happens when you're first playing a song into the studio."

Ulrich added that the band doesn't want to record in a way that feels "labored over and overthought."

Trujillo told The Pulse Of Radio that there's always a surplus of new song ideas coming out of frontman James Hetfield. "James usually comes up with a lot of stuff," he said. "He's the kind of guy where he plugs in his guitar, turns a volume knob or a, you know, a tone knob, and he comes up with, you know, the greatest riff that you can imagine. So in that case, there's no shortage of riffs and ideas."

Even though Ulrich warned that "life continues with family and personal events," he added that the band is "certainly down there [writing] pretty much every day."

METALLICA spent a lot of time outside the studio in 2014, with activities that included a string of European all-request shows last summer, being guests of honor at a film festival, and playing a week-long residency on "The Late Show With Craig Ferguson".