Metallica-Some Kind Of Monster
Without Prejudice
I am forced to rest at the moment, having a pulled muscle on my right hip, a turned ankle on my left and a form of R.S.I. Called IPad wrist. Faaaark. I hate being tied down, fettered, but every time I get up to do something I hobble, saw ow ow ow a lot and worse and curse my life. So much for my attitude of gratitude, I want to rip my journal up and throw it out the door, where the demented pup will probably try and eat it.
Lets face it, she's eaten everything else except a pair of shabby old crocs, which we hold out as a tantalising alternative, but she scorns them, can't blame her really.
So on my sweet island of rest or enforced rest, I watch a doco on Metallica. Fascinating, the venerable James Hetfield providing the eye candy and the voice and the rest of the band, the words and music. Well he helps too on the lyrics and when you see song writing in process it's a lot harder than you think.
Everyone sits in a circle, yellow legal pads at the ready and then all it takes is blood, sweat and tears. It has to be Metallica, heavy metal in style for the fans and the band members, picked out on guitars, written, crossed out, scrapped, started again. At the time of the writing that band hasn't produced anything for five years. They have come to a complete halt, burnt out, tired, no inspiration, nothing fresh. So their management hires a performance psychologist to help.
And the band decides to make a documentary about it, the making of the album, St. Anger. In all it takes nearly 700 days. In that time James checks himself into a rehab facility for six months for alcoholism. He ends up taking twelve.
James the lead singer is all raw sexual energy, enormous anger, controlling and has drunk for the rest of America since a young man. It's been part of the bands ennui. drug taking and alcohol a deadly mix, one band member died young at 24 when they were on tour. A bus crash. Bass players have come and gone over the years, but the three core members have remained the same.
James comes clean about his issues when he returns from rehab. To the camera crew at least. His parents divorced when he was 13 and his Mum passed away when he was 16. Ever since he has carried a huge fear, the fear of abandonment. He said he grew sick of the drinking in the end. It was all so boring. He wanted the excitement and ended up with boredom. It's sheer predictability killing off his addiction in the end.
Nothing to wake up in a strange bed, with a strange woman he didnt even remember and a hell of a hangover. So predictable for the Rock lifestyle it was almost a cliche he said. And when you see the fans it is no big surprise that it is so easy to go down the predictable slippery slope. Gorgeous bronzed girls flashing their tits, wearing G Strings and just about doing a Miley in front of the boys crotches.
It's ironic that the driver of the bus that killed the young Cliff Burton, their original bass player, who was only 24, when he was killed, was thought at first to be drunk, by Hetfield. It seems a predictable outcome too that the band never seems to be happy with alternative bass players until after the therapy provided by the excellent performance psych, Phil Towle.
The bassist that had replaced Burton, Jason Newstead, had left to be able to do a side line project, Echobrain. That and the entering into rehab by Hetfield almost imploded the band. Hetfield was against Newstead doing a side project fearing it would affect the entity that was Metallica. Metallica still consisted of James, Kirk Hammett and Lars Ulrich.
Before rehab James was withdrawn, sullen, uncooperative and angry. Every move or idea of the band was met with disdain and the rest of the band resented not being able to communicate with him, fearing an outburst of which there were many.
He slammed doors, sneered and remained distant.
The first sessions of counselling were awkward and fairly unproductive until Herfield finally went to rehab. One gets the love he had for the band, the only family he had really known, but he was being childish and knew it. The fans had been loyally hanging around for years, waiting for the original spark to come back.
Ulrich and Hetfield had originally formed Metallica, it was their baby, their family, their inspiration and it was falling apart, disappointing fans and themselves alike. Girlfriends, wives had come and gone, they were in Nowhere Land with nowhere to go, giving in to infighting, and yet their loyal public who attended concerts with their special Metallica salute were still out there. Waiting.
Their psychiatrist looked the most unlikely performance coach their management could have picked. He was not a heavy metal fan, he wore jumpers of outstanding geekiness, putting even Bill Gates to shame. He spoke with a soft voice and he was non confrontational.
He started with assigning the band a Mission Statement, only Kirk was getting it. Lars and James were openly hostile to the idea. Thinking it was psycho babble, psycho speak of the worst kind. But as Kirk stated, they needed it, they needed the cohesion a Mission Statement would provide.
They needed to get back to purpose, find the reason they had formed Metallica in the first place and had kept it going on good days, bad days, exhaustion. As artists it was their outlet, their expression, their talent and it needed to be brought back in to balance as soon as possible.
When Hetfield returns he is a changed man, a calmer, nicer man, who is determined to just work from 12 till 4pm and relax and do other things with the rest of the day. He has ridden himself of his inner demons and is determined to be a better band member, Father and husband. He is still not fond of the idea of having a psych on board and seems for a while to want to take back the control he has always had, but the other band members do not agree with him and in a vote of two to one keep the psych on the payroll.
The two originals have always had a strong bond but Lars goes through an angry phase with James, almost like a tantruming toddler having missed his Mummy while she was in hospital. He wants to get at James and screams into his face without an angry backlash from James and they then both seem to get along a lot better. Remembering why they are together and that the band as an entity is more important than individual egos.
They hire a new bass player, the calm and happy Robert Trujillo and its like a whole new breath of fresh air enters Metallica. Lars has had his own troubles taking on Napster for allowing their music to be illegally downloaded from the Internet. Its a long and harrowing battle and allows some of the fans to christen him LAR$.
He says on reflection that he had no idea what he was getting in to and if given his time over again, would have chosen a different course.
.
The band is ready
I am forced to rest at the moment, having a pulled muscle on my right hip, a turned ankle on my left and a form of R.S.I. Called IPad wrist. Faaaark. I hate being tied down, fettered, but every time I get up to do something I hobble, saw ow ow ow a lot and worse and curse my life. So much for my attitude of gratitude, I want to rip my journal up and throw it out the door, where the demented pup will probably try and eat it.
Lets face it, she's eaten everything else except a pair of shabby old crocs, which we hold out as a tantalising alternative, but she scorns them, can't blame her really.
So on my sweet island of rest or enforced rest, I watch a doco on Metallica. Fascinating, the venerable James Hetfield providing the eye candy and the voice and the rest of the band, the words and music. Well he helps too on the lyrics and when you see song writing in process it's a lot harder than you think.
Everyone sits in a circle, yellow legal pads at the ready and then all it takes is blood, sweat and tears. It has to be Metallica, heavy metal in style for the fans and the band members, picked out on guitars, written, crossed out, scrapped, started again. At the time of the writing that band hasn't produced anything for five years. They have come to a complete halt, burnt out, tired, no inspiration, nothing fresh. So their management hires a performance psychologist to help.
And the band decides to make a documentary about it, the making of the album, St. Anger. In all it takes nearly 700 days. In that time James checks himself into a rehab facility for six months for alcoholism. He ends up taking twelve.
James the lead singer is all raw sexual energy, enormous anger, controlling and has drunk for the rest of America since a young man. It's been part of the bands ennui. drug taking and alcohol a deadly mix, one band member died young at 24 when they were on tour. A bus crash. Bass players have come and gone over the years, but the three core members have remained the same.
James comes clean about his issues when he returns from rehab. To the camera crew at least. His parents divorced when he was 13 and his Mum passed away when he was 16. Ever since he has carried a huge fear, the fear of abandonment. He said he grew sick of the drinking in the end. It was all so boring. He wanted the excitement and ended up with boredom. It's sheer predictability killing off his addiction in the end.
Nothing to wake up in a strange bed, with a strange woman he didnt even remember and a hell of a hangover. So predictable for the Rock lifestyle it was almost a cliche he said. And when you see the fans it is no big surprise that it is so easy to go down the predictable slippery slope. Gorgeous bronzed girls flashing their tits, wearing G Strings and just about doing a Miley in front of the boys crotches.
It's ironic that the driver of the bus that killed the young Cliff Burton, their original bass player, who was only 24, when he was killed, was thought at first to be drunk, by Hetfield. It seems a predictable outcome too that the band never seems to be happy with alternative bass players until after the therapy provided by the excellent performance psych, Phil Towle.
The bassist that had replaced Burton, Jason Newstead, had left to be able to do a side line project, Echobrain. That and the entering into rehab by Hetfield almost imploded the band. Hetfield was against Newstead doing a side project fearing it would affect the entity that was Metallica. Metallica still consisted of James, Kirk Hammett and Lars Ulrich.
Before rehab James was withdrawn, sullen, uncooperative and angry. Every move or idea of the band was met with disdain and the rest of the band resented not being able to communicate with him, fearing an outburst of which there were many.
The first sessions of counselling were awkward and fairly unproductive until Herfield finally went to rehab. One gets the love he had for the band, the only family he had really known, but he was being childish and knew it. The fans had been loyally hanging around for years, waiting for the original spark to come back.
Ulrich and Hetfield had originally formed Metallica, it was their baby, their family, their inspiration and it was falling apart, disappointing fans and themselves alike. Girlfriends, wives had come and gone, they were in Nowhere Land with nowhere to go, giving in to infighting, and yet their loyal public who attended concerts with their special Metallica salute were still out there. Waiting.
Their psychiatrist looked the most unlikely performance coach their management could have picked. He was not a heavy metal fan, he wore jumpers of outstanding geekiness, putting even Bill Gates to shame. He spoke with a soft voice and he was non confrontational.
He started with assigning the band a Mission Statement, only Kirk was getting it. Lars and James were openly hostile to the idea. Thinking it was psycho babble, psycho speak of the worst kind. But as Kirk stated, they needed it, they needed the cohesion a Mission Statement would provide.
They needed to get back to purpose, find the reason they had formed Metallica in the first place and had kept it going on good days, bad days, exhaustion. As artists it was their outlet, their expression, their talent and it needed to be brought back in to balance as soon as possible.
When Hetfield returns he is a changed man, a calmer, nicer man, who is determined to just work from 12 till 4pm and relax and do other things with the rest of the day. He has ridden himself of his inner demons and is determined to be a better band member, Father and husband. He is still not fond of the idea of having a psych on board and seems for a while to want to take back the control he has always had, but the other band members do not agree with him and in a vote of two to one keep the psych on the payroll.
The two originals have always had a strong bond but Lars goes through an angry phase with James, almost like a tantruming toddler having missed his Mummy while she was in hospital. He wants to get at James and screams into his face without an angry backlash from James and they then both seem to get along a lot better. Remembering why they are together and that the band as an entity is more important than individual egos.
They hire a new bass player, the calm and happy Robert Trujillo and its like a whole new breath of fresh air enters Metallica. Lars has had his own troubles taking on Napster for allowing their music to be illegally downloaded from the Internet. Its a long and harrowing battle and allows some of the fans to christen him LAR$.
He says on reflection that he had no idea what he was getting in to and if given his time over again, would have chosen a different course.
Phil Towle states that Metallica's first album coming out of therapy will not be great but the next one will be and he is right. The band has to reform wirh Trujillo and a newly sober Hetfield, there are hiccups at first. They go back on tour as a cohesive band. The fans are waiting, ready for their heroes to return to them. Salutes at the ready, fingers outstretched in the inverted M, by the thousands/
.
The band is ready
