Metallica and Lou Reed recordan album

Thu 16th Jun, 2011 in International News

In February we reported that Metallica guitarist Kirk Hammett had cryptically told Rolling Stone that the band headed into the studio in May they wouldn’t actually be recording a ‘Metallica’ album. “I don’t want to give too much away,” Hammett teased, “it’s not really 100 percent a Metallica record. It’s a recording project, let’s put it that way… Without getting too deep into it, it’s more a recording project than a bona fide Metallica album. Whether or not we can pull it off in just two weeks remains to be seen.”

Now we finally know what the metal legends were cooking up – a ten track record featuring the legendary Lou Reed on vocals!

Reed has told Rolling Stone that the project was “a marriage made in heaven… I knew it from the first day we played together: ‘Oh, man, this is perfection, right in front of me.’ “


Reed and Metallica have played together before, appearing on stage together in October 2009 at the 25th Anniversary Rock and Roll Hall of Fame concerts in New York but this time Hammett says “It doesn’t feel like we’re his backup band. It feels like we’re a different band, in a situation we’ve never been in before”

In the report on Rolling Stone the album is described as “unpredictable and viciously tight” and “a raging union of [Reed’s] 1973 noir classic, Berlin, and Metallica’s ‘86 crusher, Master of Puppets.” The magazine also reveals details about two tracks Pumping Blood and Mistress Dread. The seven minute plus Pumping Blood, which was recorded live in one take, apparently “opens with a drone that breaks into a crunching march, goes into speed-metal gear and breaks into free-fall sections”. While Mistress Dread, features Reed singing over “a relentless staccato riff played at manic velocity”.

Drummer Lars Ulrich claims that the album is “90 percent” finished but there are no release plans yet as Reed does not have a record deal and Metallica are no longer on Warner Bros. “We are free to go wherever,” Ulrich explains, “I’m obviously psyched for people to hear this, in whatever way we feel is right.”