Metallica ‘Murder One’ Details

Metallica’s tenth studio LP, Hardwired… to Self Destruct, will be released on November 18th, and Metallica fans worldwide have been salivating over the first few tracks we’ve heard from the album. The first track to be released, “Hardwired,” was a quick tune that Metallica fans were primarily thrilled with. The song seemed to be a return to Metallica’s Kill ’em All-era roots. The second Metallica song to be released, “Moth to Flame,” has only seemed to heighten Metallica fans expectations for the released of Hardwired… to Self Destruct.

Now, after Metallica’s appearance at a Town Hall event at Sirius XM’s New York studios last Monday, Metallica revealed some details about yet another song from the upcoming album. The song “Murder One,” the members of Metallica revealed, is about Lemmy Kilmister, the legendary Motorhead frontman who died earlier this year. James Hetfield talked about what Lemmy meant to Metallica in an interview with Rolling Stone.

“Motorhead had a lot to do with Metallica sitting here right now. But just Lemmy as an entity, as kind of a father figure, he helped us a lot. He was unafraid. And he was a character. And he was himself. And we all respected that so much. He did his own thing to the last breath. No matter who you are, how could you not be inspired by that?”

Metallica members revealed that many of the lyrics for the new song, “Murder One,” are made up of Motorhead song titles.

It’s a good bet that “Murder One” will be the next song that Metallica fans get to hear off of Hardwired… to Self Destruct. “Hardwired,” the first track from the long awaited album, kind of took the world by surprise when it was released. Several weeks ago, it was stated in Rolling Stone that a snippet of the second track, “Moth into Flame,” could be heard in a promotional video for Hardwired… to Self Destruct, and then, lo and behold, “Moth into Flame” — both the song and a video to go along with it — were released last week. Considering that Metallica felt free to discuss “Murder One” in the town hall, it is probably a pretty good indicator that the Lemmy tribute song will be the next tune to be unleashed on the world in advance of the release of the album.

Metallica drummer Lars Ulrich hounded Motorhead as a teenager in Europe.

“In the summer of 1981, I followed Motorhead around on tour. That was what made me want to be in a band. When I came back to Southern California and called up James [Hetfield] I said, ‘Listen, we’ve got to give this a shot.'”

The style, aggression, and don’t give a s–t attitude were certainly a pre-cursor to what Metallica would become. From the beginning, they shunned not only the pop and soft rock of the early eighties, but also the Los Angeles glam bands that were starting to emerge at the same time. Onstage, Metallica wore what their fans wore, that being tee shirts, jeans, and sneakers. Sure, there was the occasional bullet belt, but for the most part, Metallica stayed true to their roots… for their first four albums. When their self-titled album, Metallica — commonly referred to as The Black Album — was released, some Metallica fans started to wince due to the band’s first real ballad, “Nothing Else Matters.” When Metallica members, James Hetfield, Lars Ulrich, Kirk Hammett, and Jason Newsted cut their hair for The Black Album’s followup, Load, even more hackles were raised. However, it was in those very things, the willingness to do whatever they wanted and to not follow trends, that Metallica was following in the heavy footsteps that Lemmy Kilmister had laid down ahead of them. Metallica has always done whatever they’ve wanted. Sure, there have been some missteps along the way, but the victories far, far outweigh the defeats, and that “we’ll do what we want” attitude has made Metallica the biggest hard rock act in the world today.

[Feature Photo by Theo Wargo/Getty Images for Global Citizen]