The Metallica song Lars Ulrich wants to delete from history: “It sounds really forced”
Metallica has changed the course of music history and barely put a foot wrong over the last 40 years. Their achievements far outweigh the possibilities they deemed possible when they started their journey all those decades ago, and their name is now etched on Mount Rushmore of heavy rock.
Growing up in Denmark, Ulrich didn’t believe that rock ‘n’ roll was in his trajectory. Instead, his background was unexpectedly in tennis. The drummer’s father was a professional in the sport, and Ulrich spent his youth attempting to follow in his footsteps. Though he showed application at youth level while playing tennis in Denmark, once Ulrich moved to the United States to test himself against the best, it became clear that he wasn’t destined for the top of the sport.
Thankfully, his move to Los Angeles allowed him to meet James Hetfield, form a band, and rise to the top of another profession. The achievements that Ulrich has gone on to accomplish in music significantly eclipse being an average tennis professional. Instead, Ulrich can count himself as an integral member of one of the greatest heavy metal bands ever. As a result of his prestigious position in rock, the drummer rarely wakes up in the middle of the night with flashes of regret. The metal icons have rightfully asserted themselves as one of the genre’s pioneering bands and searing songwriters. Nevertheless, like any group that has ever existed, they are capable of hitting highs as well as scraping lows.
It can be an ego boost to languish in the joys of your greatest successes, and Metallica fans could probably count dozens of songs that could take the accolade of the band’s best track. However, humans are innately critical, particularly musicians of similar standing to Ulrich, who are regularly their toughest detractors.
For a dosage of balance, it’s worth noting that while speaking to Kerrang in 2020, Ulrich picked out the band’s song ‘Sad But True’ as his favourite of their tracks. Still, in the same conversation, the drummer suggested the one he liked least. Across a stack of songs and 11 studio albums, there is only a small smattering of tunes to choose from in their canon as low points, but Ulrich settled on ‘Eye of the Beholder’ from their seminal 1988 album …And Justice For All.
Although …And Justice For All is viewed by countless Metallica fans as their most impressive body of work, Ulrich has one major issue with the album due to ‘Eye of the Beholder’. All these years later, he’s unconvinced by the song, which he now would prefer not to be included on the record. “Wherever I hear that song, it sounds kind of like — I guess we don’t want to be super-disrespectful to it — but it sounds really forced. It sounds like you put a square peg in a round hole,” Ulrich told Kerrang.
Even for a band of Metallica’s massive talent, it’s difficult to always produce solid gold, so there’s bound to be a few missteps, and this song seems like a truly clumsy stumble for Ulrich. “It sounds like it’s got two different tempos,” he continues. “There’s kind of a 4/4 feel in the intro and on the verses, and then I think the choruses are more like in a waltz tempo. It literally sounds like two different worlds rubbing up against each other. It sounds very awkward to me. I’m not a huge fan of that song.”
Of course, Ulrich is well aware that hindsight is 20/20 and also knows the band’s musical growth has allowed him to be “overly analytical” of their previous work. Fascinatingly, while he now hates the song, it hasn’t always been this way, and upon its initial creation, Ulrich saw it as a stellar piece of work.
According to Ulrich, his wealth of experience as an artist has made him hypercritical. He states, “It’s basically almost impossible for me to listen to a Metallica song without going, ‘Okay, how are the sonics? How’s the mix? How does the guitar sound? The vocals are too loud, the bass is too boomy.’ It becomes this exercise in analytics.”
Ulrich continued, “When you hear your favourite band — like if I listened to Rage Against the Machine or something, I just fucking let myself go. But when Metallica comes on, it’s like, ‘Huh?'”
While this attribute has made it difficult for Ulrich to listen to his band’s old work due to the blemishes of youth, it can also be a blessing. Ironically, this critical thinking has ensured that Metallica have outlasted most of their peers and flourished with every passing release.
