If i kick it with you all night lyrics series#
It would be a sour Metallica diehard who doesn’t feel their heart lift a little as Lux Aeterna powers along, or as Screaming Suicide erupts into a series of compact, effect-laden Kirk Hammett solos, or as the band knowingly reference their own past: whatever you make of the evil-priests-smiling-as-the-witch-is-immolated lyrics of You Must Burn!, it’s hard to miss that its musical DNA is equally composed of the final single from 1991’s Metallica, Sad But True, and Harvester of Sorrow from 1988’s …And Justice for All. Which brings us back to 72 Seasons, an album that displays the advantages and the drawbacks of such an approach.
With the release of 2008’s Death Magnetic, they effectively began doing what a lot of artists do 25-plus years into their career: returning to the sound that made them popular in the first place – albeit without the dramatic commercial slump that usually precipitates such a decision. Metallica have vociferously defended that era ever since, but clearly something about it didn’t sit right with a band who initially set themselves up as saviours of real metal amid the hairspray, makeup and MTV-friendly hitmaking of the glam era. Ultimately left for dust commercially by Iron Maiden and Def Leppard, Diamond Head nevertheless became a key influence on Metallica: Ulrich claimed the band simply “wouldn’t exist” without them.Īnd 72 Seasons was trailed by the single Lux Aeterna, essentially a Diamond Head homage, its lyrics simultaneously hymning the brotherhood of the heavy metal community, nodding to Metallica’s debut album (“full speed or nothing” sings Hetfield, recalling the mission statement of Motorbreath) and retelling the saga of Ulrich’s teenage trip to Britain, and the warm welcome afforded him: “A sea of hearts beat as one, unified … kindred alliance connected inside.” Should anyone have missed the point, there’s a line about “amplification lightning the nation”, a grammatical fudge that only makes sense as a reference to the title of Diamond Head’s debut album.īut the Metallica fan who takes Hetfield’s statement as suggesting 72 Seasons features a back-to-basics approach might note that that’s also how Metallica trailed their last two albums, a reaction to spending the 90s and early 00s exploring avenues some distance from their roots: the influence of blues and southern rock, country and Soundgarden even banning guitar solos entirely on 2003’s St Anger. At the end of the time period he mentions, the band’s drummer Lars Ulrich had saved up his paper-round money and decamped to England in search of the new wave of British heavy metal: he ended up in Stourbridge, glomming on to Diamond Head, the NWoBHM’s luckless nearly-weres. But students of Metallica’s musical roots may also find a different undercurrent in Hetfield’s statement.
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