Watch: DISTURBED's DAVID DRAIMAN Sings METALLICA, LED ZEPPELIN Classics At NITA STRAUSS's Wedding

May 5, 2024

DISTURBED's David Draiman has shared a video of him singing the METALLICA classic "Enter Sandman" at the wedding of Nita Strauss, the guitar shredder for the ALICE COOPER band, and her longtime boyfriend, drummer and manager Josh Villalta, which was held on Saturday, May 4 at The Hollywood Roosevelt hotel in Los Angeles, California. Joining Draiman for the performance were Villalta and DISTURBED bassist John Moyer. Draiman's girlfriend Sarah Uli also shared a short clip of him singing the LED ZEPPELIN classic "Whole Lotta Love" at the same event. Check out both videos below.

Among the other guests at the wedding were Nita's Cooper bandmates Alice Cooper and Chuck Garric, pop-rock singer Demi Lovato and her fiancé Jordan "Jutes" Lutes, and celebrity chef Chris Santos and his wife, actress Natalie Makenna.

In a 2018 interview Kerrang! magazine, Draiman singled out METALLICA's 1984 full-length "Ride The Lightning" as one of the most important releases during his formative years.

"The power, the complexity, the aggression — there's so many things that would attract anyone to METALLICA," Draiman said. "I think that they are the prime example of a metal band.

"'Creeping Death', that was a special song for me as a kid, because that was the one that every single Jewish kid thought, 'Oh, METALLICA wrote a song for us. He wrote it about the exodus of the Jews from Egypt under slavery,'" he continued. "We all used to get into that. I remember just the glee we all used to experience when [we heard], 'Hebrews born to serve, to the pharaoh.' That line alone was just, like, 'Yes! Vindication!' We were recognized in a METALLICA song.

"That one, [and] 'Fade To Black', certainly — those have to be my top two favorites on the record," David added. "I love 'Trapped Under Ice' too. But 'Fade To Black', just this amazing construct — a song that defied the definition of what METALLICA was perceived to be at the time. [I] love it.

"Other music that 'Ride The Lightning' led me to discover was to start really kind of sinking my teeth into some of the thrash of the era that I literally had no exposure to — whether it was SLAYER, whether it was TESTAMENT, whether it was MEGADETH. It was the opening of a doorway, for me, to a whole new palette of music.

"When I hear the album now, it still makes me feel the same burst of excitement and energy and power that it did when I first heard it.

"The album changed my life [in that] it gave me a very rude awakening to the heavier side of music, and I'm very happy to be awake."

Asked if he ever had a chance to hang out with the METALLICA members over the years, Draiman told "The Metal Hammer Magazine Show" in a 2015 interview: "Yeah, quite a few times. They are an incredible bunch of guys — they really are. Very gracious, humble and warm and just so supportive of the other upstarts in the hard rock and heavy metal community. They are such a pillar in the community. We respect them beyond words."

DISTURBED's latest album, "Divisive", was released in November 2022.

Posted by Dean Karr on Sunday, May 5, 2024

Posted by Dean Karr on Sunday, May 5, 2024

Posted by Sarah Uli on Sunday, May 5, 2024

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