ABC/Randy HolmesEarlier this month, Metallica released a deluxe reissue of their 1988 opus …And Justice for All. In an interview with Rolling Stone, drummer Lars Urlich reflects on the band’s Damaged Justice tour in support of the album, and how it impacted the direction of their next effort, the mega-successful Black Album.
Damaged Justice was, at the time, Metallica’s biggest headlining tour, from the venue size to production. It also came at a time when the metal legends were at their most progressive — …And Justice for All was filled with different musical moments and changing time signatures. Playing those songs live, Ulrich says, made Metallica rethink the band’s direction.
“That’s when we started having a few conversations that maybe we had taken the progressive side of Metallica as far as it could go and we were all yearning for stuff that was little bit simpler and maybe a little more physical,” Ulrich remembers. “A lot of that stuff was very heady and cerebral, like, ‘Here I am onstage and I’m just constantly thinking about the next part.'”
Lars continues, “I remember that some of the earlier songs worked a little…better as the places got bigger in terms of the physicality of it. So a few months later, when we started writing again, that’s when ‘Enter Sandman,’ ‘Sad but True’ and ‘Wherever I May Roam’ was born. It was a new direction.”
Those songs would go on to form the foundation of The Black Album, which remains Metallica’s most successful release.
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