The metal band Dave Grohl will never let go of: “You will have to pry them from my cold dead hands”
There aren’t many branches of rock and roll that Dave Grohl hasn’t explored.
Having been a prominent guest musician for artists like Zac Brown, Nine Inch Nails, and Queens of the Stone Age, the Foo Fighters frontman could likely create a full-on bluegrass record and still make it sound impressive. However, no matter how far Grohl ventures out of his comfort zone, he has always been drawn to heavy music, with Metallica remaining a cornerstone of his record collection.
Then again, the punk rock squats that Grohl had been playing in the late 1980s probably seemed like the furthest thing from Metallica. After all, when Metallica released their commercial crossover with The Black Album, Grohl’s stint with Nirvana had started, which seemed to spit in the face of the rockstar mentality that James Hetfield and Lars Ulrich helped pioneer in those days.
That wasn’t where the thrash titans started out, though. If anything, they were actually closer to punk in their early days, with the beginnings of thrash taking the intensity and speed of groups like Ramones and combining it with the heavy riffs of Black Sabbath and Judas Priest. Even their debut, Kill Em All, could be considered Metallica’s punk album, given how primitive and chaotic a lot of the riffs are.
That shared DNA helps explain why Grohl has never viewed punk and metal as opposing camps. While the two scenes often developed distinct identities, they were built on many of the same ideals: playing with absolute conviction, rejecting unnecessary excess and channelling raw energy into every performance. Metallica simply expressed those principles through technical precision rather than the stripped-back approach favoured by most hardcore bands.
It’s a connection that has quietly run throughout Grohl’s own career. Whether drumming with the relentless force that defined Nirvana or writing stadium-sized rock songs with Foo Fighters, he’s consistently borrowed from both traditions without feeling the need to choose between them. His admiration for Metallica, then, has always felt less like an exception to his musical tastes than a natural extension of them.
They never lost that fire in their belly, either. When breaking in newcomer Jason Newsted, one of the covers they included on his debut EP Garage Days Revisited was a medley of Misfits’ ‘Green Hell’ and ‘Last Caress’, so it wasn’t like there wasn’t some crossover.
As much as Grohl loved intense playing, he was also a massive prog fan, and given the complexity of songs like ‘Master of Puppets’ and ‘Disposable Heroes’, he had a drum hero in Lars Ulrich. Yes, it’s easy to clown on Ulrich’s playing abilities now, but hearing him pummel his drum kit practically sounded like he was playing the equivalent of lead guitar fills with sticks instead of a pick.
Despite Grohl going in a different direction with Foo Fighters, he always had a love for everything Metallica did, telling GQ, “I love Lars Ulrich. He’s always been a huge influence. I bought the first Metallica record the month it came out. I am a die-hard fan, and you will have to pry their CDs from my cold dead hands.”
It’s not like Grohl’s old bandmate would disapprove, either. Though the stadium rock version of Metallica may have been an acquired taste for metalheads, Kurt Cobain was always outspoken about his love for early Metallica, even going to a handful of shows after Nevermind came out to see if they would play the song ‘Whiplash’.
While Grohl was more interested in getting crowds to sing along to every note he played, anyone’s love for Metallica is embedded into their DNA the moment they hear them. No matter how many times he plays a song like ‘Monkey Wrench’ live, no one writes a riff like ‘Stacked Actors’ without having a healthy respect for what Hetfield did.
