Artist Playlists
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Surveying Metallica's career is like looking at one of those evolution-of-man illustrations: You see how they became what they are. It's not that the band went from dragging their knuckles to walking upright so much as they continually expanded and diversified their sound. From the thrash of Ride the Lightning to the baroque song-suites of … And Justice for All, from the blockbuster ballads of Metallica to the hard-rock revival of Load, they've synthesized their past while pushing into the future. More than just help invent metal, the band grew with it, exploring just about every variable of playing fast and loud. - Metallica's videos represent some of thrash's most powerful imagery. Spanning the length of their career and featuring everything from dizzying special effects (“The Memory Remains”) to a live performance at San Quentin State Prison (“St. Anger”) to wild action in film-historical locations (“I Disappear”), these clips capture all of the band's singular ferocity and ingenuity.
- It's Electric! is a weekly window into the mind of Metallica's Lars Ulrich. Updated regularly, Lars' playlist contains music from friends and collaborators, as well as musicians he admires.
- Metallica's studio albums have always been varied affairs, and the same goes for their live shows. While the frantically buzzing “Creeping Death” captures their vintage thrash days, the lavish rocker “Fuel” features the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra. The riveting acoustic version of “Disposable Heroes” is unforgettable—a harrowing anti-war tale originally from 1986's Master of Puppets.
- Back in the early '80s, Metallica were just tape-trading fans obsessed with the hardest sounds the underground had to offer. Combining their love for raging punk rock and raw heavy metal, Metallica helped to invent the furious sound of thrash, but if you blast this hard and heavy collection of the pioneering band's inspirations, you'll also find vintage hard rock, complex prog, and much more.
- “We are trying to find any possible ways to connect with our fans and with the Metallica family,” Lars Ulrich says about the current pandemic. “I think that a positive coming out of these five dark months is that it's forcing you to rethink what you know and what we're so used to, so a new world order calls for new experimental times and shenanigans.” In his At Home With conversation with Zane Lowe, the Metallica drummer and co-founder says he has been spending time with his sons, watching lots of music documentaries and concerts on YouTube, and working out to Iron Maiden. He also gave an update on future Metallica plans: “We've spent a few of the summer months trading riffs and ideas, throwing creative thoughts back and forth through Zoom calls and other technologies.” As the band returns with a new live album and concert film release, Metallica and San Francisco Symphony: S&M2, Ulrich has curated an exclusive Apple Music playlist of songs inspired by his binge-watching and including Thin Lizzy, Joni Mitchell, Dire Straits, and U2, whose track “Bad” is included here. “In 1985, it was completely unprecedented,” he says of U2's iconic Live Aid performance, in which Bono pulled a concertgoer out of an overexcited crowd at Wembley Stadium. “Bono went into the audience and grabbed the girl, which really was the point that made U2 superstars. It was just such a moment that the world had never really experienced before.”
- Grab the mic and sing along with some of their biggest hits.
- To celebrate their latest album, <i>72 Seasons</i>, Metallica is shaking up the format of its tour. Instead of performing one night at each venue, the pioneering metal band is doing two nights back-to-back, each with totally different set lists, different supporting acts, and a strict promise to not play the same song twice in each city. They've also reimagined the structure of the stage itself. Rather than playing at one end of the stadium, they're performing on a giant, donut-shaped platform amid the fans (diehards can stand in the centre, an area aptly titled the Snake Pit). In other words: headbanging heaven. Whether you're prepping for an upcoming show or reminiscing about one you recently attended, explore the tour-inspired set list here and put yourself in the pit.
- Zane joins Metallica in Amsterdam for the launch of their world tour and a discussion about their LP.
- For Metallica guitarist and singer James Hetfield, the band—even in its earliest days, when they made the decision to leave Los Angeles to cut their teeth in San Francisco’s music scene—was only interested in heading in one direction: forward, and on to the next thing on the bucket list. “We were asked, ‘What was plan B?’” he told Apple Music’s Zane Lowe. “It's like, 'Well, plan B was making plan A work.' As simple as that. There was no other plan: It was 'We're going to do this. And if it doesn't work out, then whatever happens, happens.' But honestly, that's what happened throughout our careers. We don't know what's happening next. We'd let the challenges come to us, and then write about them, use them as what they're supposed to be, which is experiencing life. Yeah, there was a goal, but our goals changed—'oh, our goal is to get a tour bus.' And, 'Okay, now we got that. Now we're going to go on tour with a bigger band.' And then this, and then that. And the slow, constant climb up.” In a far-reaching conversation about four decades of Metallica, Hetfield, drummer Lars Ulrich, guitarist Kirk Hammett, and bassist Robert Trujillo walked Lowe through their formative experiences, their highs and lows, their favourite memories of making music together, and their origin story, which began with Ulrich placing a classified ad in search of like-minded rockers on the rise. He and Hetfield hit it off, as they were both driven to make the dream happen at all costs, even if it meant picking up and leaving town to do so. “When we were down here by ourselves in LA, we were so contrary to everything that was going on, on the Strip and the clubs,” he remembered of their early years. “We were just fuelled by the contrariness. When we went to San Francisco, that was the first time that we belonged to something. There were people up there that were like us; there were people up there that were listening to the same music, that felt like we did. And there was a whole collection of misfits up in San Francisco—especially in the East Bay—that were sort of like all the same ilk as us. It was the first time I think we felt that sense of belonging to any place.” Hammett joined the band shortly after its formation, and Trujillo came into the fold in 2003. (Cliff Burton, Metallica’s founding bassist, died in a tragic tour bus accident in 1986, then was replaced by Jason Newsted.) Trujillo recalls entering the orbit of Metallica as a member of Suicidal Tendencies, an act that opened for them on tour, in the months leading up to the recording of their self-titled 1991 LP, commonly known as the Black Album. To celebrate its 30th anniversary, Metallica released The Metallica Blacklist, an enormous, 53-track tribute to the record that features covers of its songs from a wide and compelling array of artists, from Elton John and Miley Cyrus to Flatbush Zombies and Phoebe Bridgers. “These are songs that all of us are used to hearing a certain way, and then all of a sudden it's like an explosion of all these different types of versions, and I'm amazed,” Hammett said of the Blacklist. “There's been cover versions of Metallica songs since the Black Album came out,” added Ulrich. “Earlier, we were playing with Miley, and Elton John was on a Zoom call,” said Hetfield. “And he says, 'Nothing Else Matters' is one of the most beautiful melodies and love songs written.' And I was like, 'No way, there's no way this man is saying that! He wrote “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road” and “Candle in the Wind,” come on! Are you sure?' A huge compliment, and I will take it for what it is.”