Stereo Warning

I’ve used a good part of my life worrying about the future. I’ve always been good at looking ahead, more than most. And that creates that restless energy you’re talking about, but I’ve been better at dealing with it.

You’re in a business that sings praises to the new young thing. How do you deal with that?
I’m okay with getting older, also in this business. Shit, when I look at my dad, he’ll be 80 years old very soon. It’s inspiring. He is so calm. I’m not panicking over having already lived half my life or whatever (knocks three times on the table). I’m happy and I like being here now. Besides, all the new cool bands that are coming, such as Sword, when those boys stand backstage and stare while I bang the drums, it gives me a spark – now I’ve got to show them how it’s done.

Will you be on stage when you’re old like Charlie Watts from the Rolling Stones?
I have no clue. The way things are going right now inside the band, mentally we can do it till we’re 100 years old. We’re doing alright. The problem is not here (points to the head) but down here (points to shoulders, back and neck). This metal that we’re doing pulls your teeth out. I have no idea if I’ll be able to play the way I want to when I’m 65. No disrespect to Charlie Watts, the Rolling Stones inspire me and we have played with them, but it’s a whole different thing technically and physically playing their hits like “Start Me Up” compared to playing “Damage Inc.” or “Fight Fire With Fire” or the other speed shit we play. I can see that the man that works the hardest on this tour – apart from me, of course, ha ha – is our physiotherapist, who is on call 24/7.

Back to your father. He has been a huge part of your life. How is he these days?
I have a very close relationship to my father. We travel a lot together. My ex-wife, about whom I won’t say anything bad, had a tough time with the concept of family because she had a difficult relationship with her own family. In the years we were together we didn’t visit each other’s families that much, but now with Ms. Nielsen, she loves my father and in the last five years we’ve really fired up our relationship again. It’s brilliant, he’s so inspiring. He’s so nostalgic and always tells stories of the old days but also talks about philosophy and this and that, so when you are with him you always leave richer, better and smarter.

He’s lived such an unusual life, how has that influenced you?
It was a different upbringing over there in Hellerup. It was different in our house compared to most of the houses of my classmates. But I’m really thankful for that today. My mom and dad did a great job making sure that I wasn’t trapped by all that freedom I had as a boy and that I wasn’t blind to how the rest of society worked even though I was privileged. We’re trying to teach our kids the same thing.

You moved to USA when you were 16-17, how was that?
Dad was going there to play tennis, so I went too to try to play tennis as well. I lived in a weird place that is called Newport Beach which makes the north of Copenhagen (rich suburbs, ed.) look like a slum. It was a little odd for me after two years of having hanging out in Christiania every day all of a sudden to hang out with all these rich pigs in their pink Lacoste shirts. I started to associate tennis with that world and so the rebel in me said fuck this shit, I’ll go and play rock music instead. Now the U.S. has been my home for 25 years and I love where I live. San Francisco is brilliant and my kids are Danish-American.

You’ve smashed many drums to pieces since then. Have you made it?
I won’t play it down, it’s been a long run, a hard run, but I’m not one of those that sets a target… I have a goal… I’ve always been afraid that if you have a goal and you don’t get there naturally you can change direction and become fake and creativity will be influenced negatively. The life I live today was not something I particularly was looking for when I was young. I just wanted to play music and drink some beer, hang out and meet some nice girls. It’s the same plan I have today, ha ha ha. Now we’ve all found the nice girls, but hopefully we’ll still have some beers later, instead of this protein shake.

This is also a world full of pitfalls. How did you deal with those?
We have been lucky and smart enough not to let those overcome us. I think the love for what we do has been so strong that it overcame the worst crises. There were the drugs, the fights, all that shit. But we’ve always been able to sit down, talk to each other and find ourselves again. Because Metallica is more important than all that nonsense. We’re lucky that the personalities in this band managed to keep their feet on the ground… okay there have been a couple times when there were some slipups, but shit 27 years, that’s something.

How is it being on stage today?
It’s hard to describe. I become a 12-year-old kid again. I sit there and think wow, this is pretty cool! When I’m up there it’s the best two hours ever. It’s a comfortable place, because nobody comes and tells me what to do. it’s a safe place.

Why did you decide to work with Rick Rubin?
We got Bob Rock in the 80’s, it was because he was making the best records back then, and Rick Rubin is making the best records now. We’ve always been very afraid of repeating ourselves, that’s why we’ve run in so many directions, perhaps too many. Especially me, I’ve always been terrified of doing the same shit twice. Rick got us to find inspiration in the old stuff, more musically complex Metallica. All 10 tracks on this album are from 7 to 9 minutes and we’ve gone back to working a lot with changing tempos.

What about the lyrics?
The album is called Death Magnetic. It’s not just about cruising and women. All the lyrics are about death. James wrote them and I think he’s done a great job. They are very dark, poetic. A lot of exciting things are happening in James Hetfield’s head.

Is he doing better now, he doesn’t drink anymore?
Of course, but the demons that live inside don’t disappear, they just sit under a lid and come out every once in a while. I think you can work a lot on it, but what’s in your DNA you can’t run from.

What is it with metal boys and art?
I’ve always been interested in art. When you’re lucky enough to sell all these records, you can all of a sudden get all these things that you like. I began by buying a few things by Asger Jorn and Sonja Ferlov, then I went on to people like Jean-Michel Basquiat and Willem de Kooning. These days I buy especially things from galleries, the new, young people. What attracts me to painting art is that it has nothing to do with Metallica. Here I am just Lars instead of Lars Ulrich from Metallica. It’s another identity, my world alone, where I can be myself.

Do you have a big collection?
I do, but I change it often. I found out a few years ago that I don’t want to own art. You don’t own art, it’s just something you take for a while until you pass it on.

Tags: photos pictures lars ulrich metallica james hetfield kirk hammett rob trujillo robert trujillo