The Pit

The press release says:

“In celebration of the historic grand opening of the Chase Center—the new 18,064-seat arena in San Francisco’s Mission Bay neighborhood—two preeminent musical forces of the Bay Area will join together for the first time in 20 years: On Friday, September 6, Metallica and the San Francisco Symphony will commemorate this most anticipated addition to San Francisco’s cultural landscape by christening the new Chase Center stage with a one-night-only show. The S&M2 concert will also mark the 20th anniversary of Metallica and the SF Symphony’s groundbreaking 1999 S&M (“Symphony & Metallica”) concerts—and its subsequent film and album releases. 

Legendary conductor Michael Tilson Thomas completes the first week of his final season as San Francisco Symphony Music Director with a special appearance, conducting a portion of the show.”

Lars Ulrich had this to say:

“This is beyond exciting on so many fronts. The fact that San Francisco is finally getting a much needed world-class arena, the fact that Metallica get to be part of the opening celebration, the fact that we get to revisit S&M 20 years later, and the fact that we get to share the stage not only with the San Francisco Symphony once again, but with the legend himself, MTT, as he kicks off his final year as music director here in San Francisco. This is mind-blowingly awesome… bring it on ASAP!!!”

It's not sounding good for any last Big Four shows before Slayer retire according to an interview conducted with Metallica bassist Rob Trujillo on Australia's "The Music" podcast:

"To be honest, I haven't heard any conversations about the 'Big Four,'" Robert responded. "We love SLAYER — I love SLAYER; they're one of my favorite bands. And ANTHRAX is amazing. And that was great what we did a few years back. But I haven't heard any conversations about that. I mean, obviously, we're still in the middle of our tour. And I'm not sure what [the other bands] are doing. I know, yeah, SLAYER is definitely on their final tour. I'm not even sure SLAYER's up for that or what."  

He continued: "It's a weird question, because it hasn't been talked about or discussed, because everybody is kind of in the middle of their stuff right now. So I don't even know how to answer that. But I can say it was an incredible experience, and we all had a blast. And it was something that no one thought could really be done, and then it happened. And it was a beautiful thing. But, you know, I think at some point, everybody kind of moves on and they get wrapped up in their stuff, and that's kind of where everybody's at right now." 

I would agree with you, but there's one major issue with your argument. Blood Fire Death is not in The Pit. It's a pure The North release.

Here's what Lars posted on his Instagram account last Friday:

"Today 30 years ago, February 22 '89, we played the Grammys for the first time and that was quite a mindfuck!!  First time we were in front of a mainstream TV audience. First time mainstream America was exposed to whatever the hell it is we do. First time they had a hard rock/metal category on the Grammys. First time we were Grammy losers, since JETHRO TULL, somewhat unexpectedly to most people, walked away with the win.  But all was not lost. The expressions of disgust from most members of the audience (other than Iggy!) is something I will treasure for the rest of my life. And I was rocking some pretty crazy hair that was edging dangerously close to a mullet! Happy days indeed!!"

I remember this occurring when I was in my early teens but the truly ridiculous nature of this decision didn't truly sink in at the time. It wasn't just that calling Jethro Tull's music hard rock (let alone heavy metal) was a huge stretch. It was also that their 1989 album "Rock Island" (their seventeenth album to that time) was also amongst the band's poorest performing records from a purely critical point of view. To put it into perspective, it would be kinda like ignoring all of Black Sabbath's classic 70's records & awarding them a prize for "Never Say Die!" Unbelievable! But at least Lars has a sense of humour about it.

Here's a new interview from a few days ago with Phil Anselmo of Pantera/Down/Philip H. Anselmo & The Illegals/Superjoint Ritual/Necrophagia/etc:

http://damnationvault.com/interviews/an-interview-with-philip-h-anselmo-by-jenna-williams/

While I'm happy to hear that Sean is healthy, I can't say that I'm thrilled to hear that he will be placed behind a microphone again.

I was just reading the below interviews with Kirk Hammett & Lars Ulrich from Metallica & was wondering how you all feel about the band's supposed return to their roots & how successful you think they've been with that approach. 

Kirk Hammett: "I think for right now, there's a little bit of a vacuum for us and bands that sound like us. There are a lot of great new bands out there, but I think people yearn for something that they know is made in a real sense. I think there's a bit of authenticity that comes with us that might not be attached to some of the more contemporary bands. We can be counted on to deliver in some form or another something that's real and authentic and something that has integrity. I think that really means a lot to some people these days, when a lot of music is just kind of like made by pressing a button… People can count on us showing up with our instruments and actually making music right there in the moment. And we deliver. Whatever you hear on our album, we can play live. I will not even try to count how many bands are incapable of that. I think that's part of it. Certainly, with 2008's 'Death Magnetic', we learned that it was okay to embrace our past with sort of a revisionist approach. That's what 'Death Magnetic' kind of started as. To an extent, it's continued with 'Hardwired' too. We like to play music from all of the different eras, and at this particular point in our lives, playing the heavier stuff just is appealing to us. It feels right to me and it feels right to the other guys in the band." 

Lars Ulrich: "Hardwired… To Self-Destruct" is possibly the band's most successful record in 25 years in terms of reception. Obviously, this record isn't shipping as many units as records did 10 or 20 years ago, but the perception is that it's probably our most well-received record since 'The Black Album.' So, to have that 30-plus years into your career, and to make a record that connects at that level — still — is crazy cool. Like, we'll meet people at meet-and-greets and they'll be, like, 'My favorite song is 'Now That We're Dead'' and 'My favorite song is 'Halo On Fire'. This record is being received with the same appreciation as any of our other records. That's something that we didn't expect. And that's something that anyone who has been doing this as long as us should never take for granted." 

Personally, I haven't heard anything that's worth listening to from Metallica since 1991 with the possible exception of the "Garage Inc. compilation which doesn't really count. Even though "Load" & "Reload" left me with a very bad taste in my mouth, at least they were an example of a band taking risks & making an artistic statement. The same can said for the awful "Lulu" experiment. But I can't say the same for the last few albums. "St. Anger" was a clear attempt to jump onto modern trends while "Death Magnetic" & "Hardwired...to Self-Destruct" are the sound of a band that has accepted that they've failed with their last 25 years of recorded output & are simply happy enough to try to win back their old fans with a watered down version of their classic sound. It's an inherently inauthentic approach which seems like the total opposite of how Kirk thinks he's perceived & that really does prove that the band are completely detached from their fanbase & the modern music industry.

Your thoughts?