The era of Metallica that James Hetfield said “doesn’t work”: “It didn’t seem natural to me”
Some of the best artists in the world were only doing what came naturally to them. It’s easy to try to write what your audience wants, but the real risks come when you create something from your soul rather than focusing on making a quick buck. Even though James Hetfield was known to reveal the darker sides of himself in every Metallica song, he admitted that he was a fish out of water when working on the follow-up to The Black Album.
If you look at where Metallica was at that point, there is no real road map for where to go. They had been one of the biggest names in underground music, and suddenly, they were above ground making the kind of songs that made them pin up stars on the same level as Guns N’ Roses from around the same time.
So, how are you supposed to build on that? If you try to mix it up again, you run the risk of alienating your hardcore fans even more, and if you go in to make the same record over again, you’re going to get accused of being a one-trick pony. No option is optimal, so Load was a case of Metallica trying to do both at the same time.
While most of the songs stayed within the typical framework of The Black Album, Hetfield was willing to bring in some other influences, including his lover for stoner metal and country leanings on songs like ‘Mama Said’. Then again, Lars Ulrich and Kirk Hammett’s desire to embrace styles like industrial and flashy rock and roll didn’t feel right, either, leading to a lot of sessions where it felt like they were throwing anything at the wall to see what stuck.
Despite the intense backlash they received from fans during the Load era, there are still a few great songs to choose from. ‘Until It Sleeps’ is a great slow-burner, and if we include ReLoad in this discussion, singles like ‘The Memory Remains’ and ‘Fuel’ are some of the best hard rock you were going to find out of the mid-1990s.
That didn’t stop fans from getting pissed when seeing their new look. The band had also streamlined themselves to go with a more alternative look, which meant the hair came down, and everyone adopted this black eyeliner that came off more like a goth GQ model than a metal warlord.
As far as Hetfield was concerned, he could have done without so much experimenting behind the scenes, telling Louder, “A lot of the fans got turned off quite a bit from the music but mostly, I think, from the image. It just doesn’t work. You absolutely have to evolve, but let’s have it evolve naturally. It didn’t seem natural to me”.
Although the band could have easily kept doing what they were doing, it’s easy to see why Hetfield had some questions about their future. I mean, your band is called Metallica, and yet you’re writing the kinds of songs that feel like they could have been made by a commercialised version of what an alternative metal band sounded like.
Even years after the fact, Hetfield didn’t hold back his feelings about the two records, pointing to them as an example of working anything into shape, even if it wasn’t the greatest composition. While Load and ReLoad aren’t really the first things that come to mind when you talk about Metallica, they are still decent releases that may have had a far greater impact on the music world than most people realise.
