“I can’t stop being bewildered by all these people who say, ‘That guy sucks!’ I’ve got news for you – you don’t get to where you’re at if you suck! Okay?” Kirk Hammett on why bad solos are dying – and dealing with armchair guitar critics
Towards the end of 2023, we caught up with Metallica's affable lead guitarist to take stock of one of the greatest years in the Bay Area metal behemoth's history, and to talk guitars, songwriting and gear
(Image credit: Mario Skraban/Redferns)
It began in Amsterdam on April 27, 2023. 17 months later, Metallica’s epic M72 world tour will reach its conclusion with a show in Mexico City on September 29.
In this previously unpublished interview, the band’s lead guitarist Kirk Hammett looks back on the tour and the 72 Seasons album, and explains how and why he is constantly adapting his approach as a player, songwriter and performer.
When you look back on the making of 72 Seasons, what gives you the most satisfaction?
“The crazy thing about 72 Seasons is that it just flowed. The riffs were great; lots of high-energy. It was a reprioritisation of what Metallica is, what Metallica means to us all. There was an immense amount of trust. People could take as much responsibility as they wanted and do what they needed to do and that in itself was a great thing.
“ I mean, we trust each other, right? But sometimes we don’t trust each other to make the right decisions! And it’s nothing personal. It is all for the betterment of the band. It’s all for the wellbeing of the music.
“But this time around, there was a confidence and a trust in everyone that really just made a difference. From day one, that trust was there. I didn’t think we had a choice – we had to trust each other. And we managed to squeeze out a really great album.”
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You told TG that for this album you tracked a lot of solos and sent them over to Lars (Ulrich, drummer) and Greg Fidelman (producer) to cherry-pick the best. Is that really a new approach for you? Your solos have always had this improvisational quality.
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“I have always done a version of that, but on this album I just went in with smaller concepts. I wanted the solos to be more ’70s rock solos, or in a nutshell, Angus Young! It never, ever sounded like Angus worked anything out. It sounded like he just went in there and went for it, and so that’s what I did. I had to do it this way because it was how I felt inside. Internally, it felt like the right thing to do at this point.
I wanted spontaneity. I didn’t want picture-perfect solos, because some of my favourite players’ solos were kind of rag-tag, a lot of them, and I love that
“I wanted spontaneity. I didn’t want picture-perfect solos, because some of my favourite players’ solos were kind of rag-tag, a lot of them, and I love that. Don’t get me wrong – I love precision, too. I listen to jazz. I listen to prog. And I love precision. I love well-crafted guitar solos, but it really felt like I should show up at the studio and just fucking go for it, man! Get that feeling and go for it.
“And, having said that, this is a one-time thing. I don’t think on future albums I will be doing this, because if I do this again in the future I have a real fear of repeating myself. It’s just I have a fear of being redundant. So this is not going to be my approach to solos on the next album.”
Metallica: Moth Into Flame (Seattle, WA - September 1, 2024) - YouTube
“I don’t know what my approach will be on the next album! I usually decide once I hear the music. I might be playing really super-clean jazz solos or something. But then the other guys might try and kick me out of the band!
“Who knows? I don’t know, but I don’t spend a lot of time worrying about it, because I know once I sit down and clear my mind and play, I get ideas. Stuff just appears.
“I can just rely on that stuff to appear and then just act on it, and that is the beauty of being a musician, and music in general. Music just appears, and you have the choice of doing what you want to do with it. Change an idea, make it longer, make it heavier, make it lighter, whatever. It’s just like clay.”
Metallica: 72 Seasons (Official Music Video) - YouTube
When you talk about clearing the mind, is that also the key to songwriting for you?
“Agreed, 100 per cent. This is my M.O., and I do this all the time – it’s really very simple. There is no hard science or years of experience needed for this. A person that’s been playing guitar for, like, two weeks can do this. I just sit there, I try to clear my mind, close my eyes, just relax, and then I just start playing and I listen.
Don’t think about the past or what has been done. Don’t think about the future and what you need to do. Just see what you can grab in the moment. That’s how I write
“I listen to the notes being played. I am not looking at my guitar. I want to be somewhere different on the neck. And I just listen to the notes and I start getting ideas. ‘All right! The first note and the fourth note are great. I’ll stick with those notes. What’s gonna be the second and third one? What can we change?’ And then the idea comes.”
How do you deal with writer’s block?
“Don’t think about the past or what has been done. Don’t think about the future and what you need to do. Just see what you can grab in the moment. That’s how I write music, and it has turned me into a more prolific composer because I don’t get stuck like I used to.
“I used to get writing blocks for months and months and months, and not write a riff for months, and get frustrated about it, and think about smashing my guitar. That doesn’t happen anymore.”
(Image credit: Scott Legato/Getty Images)
Do you think of songwriting as an imprecise art?
“It’s all about experimentation that’s propelling that whole thing forward, propelling it forward and giving it more momentum – more momentum to see it through. One thing that we are all aware of, and it’s not spoken about, is when you are trying to come up with stuff, and you’re trying to write songs, there is a difference between adding to a song or making a song better.
“So you’ve got a song. You’ve got a part. Add it on. Does it necessarily make the song better? Maybe so, but usually not! There is a point where you have to stop yourself and say, ‘Okay, I am just adding onto the song. I’m not necessarily making the song better.’ A lot of times we will go back and frigging really rearrange the song and edit it, and take, like, two minutes out of a song.”
Many of Metallica’s songs originate from stockpiled ideas – drawn from what you call ‘the riff bank’…
“The riff bank is used in two instances. It’s used for our riffs, ‘Okay, go to the riff bank, we’ll take this riff, we’re gonna build a song around this riff.’ And we’re building and building, and then we come to a standstill and no one can come up with anything in the moment that works, then we’ll go back to the riff bank. ‘Okay, anything in there that will work?’ And we’ll pluck something out of there and then, all of a sudden, the ideas start flowing again.”
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Last year you acquired a ‘Factory Black’ 1959 Gibson Les Paul Standard. What does it sound like?
“It is a beautiful-sounding guitar. It is so well balanced. It is a real blues, jazz, rock guitar – a hard rock guitar. But it doesn’t quite have that extra 10 to 15 per cent aggression for me to use it in Metallica. Greg [Fidelman] and I came to the conclusion that it is almost too pretty! But for single lines, for single-note stuff and leads? Oh man, it’s so nice! It sings!
“And the thing about it, because it has been so well looked after, and so well played, it sounds really even. The pickups have aged really nicely. It’s a real smooth bridge pickup sound, a real smooth neck pickup sound. The playability of the guitar is amazing.”
Have you made any interesting gear discoveries recently?
“Well, about five years ago I figured out that Marshalls sound the best in Britain. You plug a Marshall straight into the wall in London and it will sound 30 per cent better than the same Marshall hooked up to the wall in America. It’s everything to do with the voltage. And it would drive me crazy because it would sound different from show to show!”
Has your approach to preparing for a show changed at all over the years?
“For me, when I get to a show I am all-business. It is all about doing everything I need to do to make the show the best as possible. Or, in other words, I am not sitting around backstage watching TV or socialising, or doing whatever.
“Everything I do, from minute to minute, has everything to do with the show, whether I am warming up, running through my own personal warm-ups or warming up with the other guys as a band.”
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“The only thing I really, really worry about during our live shows is whether I can hear myself or not, because we put ourselves in situations, like the M72 stage, where it is extremely, extremely challenging to hear yourself or the other band members.
“The monitor system is pushed to its absolute limits as far as being able to hear ourselves on that big stage. We have monitors everywhere. We have in-ears. We have two monitor engineers - one for James [Hetfiield, guitarist/vocalist] and Lars, one for Rob [Trujillo, bassist] and I, because one guy can’t do it. There’s too much switching from song to song. It’s pretty difficult!”
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The M72 tour stage design has offered changing perspectives, from full-on stadium to club to arena…
“It’s so crazy how it shifts like that for me in numerous times during the course of the show. I think people pick up on the fact because we are on cameras the whole time, video monitors the whole time. When we are playing to the Snakepit it feels like we are playing in a club, the camera is right there, and then we are projecting that club feel to the stadium, so I think that helps – that helps in creating intimacy.”
I don’t think bad guitar solos even exist anymore because everyone is just so much better than they used to be
At this stage of your career, does criticism still hurt you?
“My attitude is that if you’re out there and you’re touring, and you’re making albums, and you’re recording, there is no way you suck. And so I can’t stop being bewildered by all these people who say, ‘This guy sucks! That guy sucks!’ Hey, I’ve got news for you – you don’t get to where you’re at if you fucking suck! Okay?
“These people are talking on 10 per cent of what they see in all of these people musically. It’s incredible. I don’t think anyone really sucks. These days, I don’t think bad guitar solos even exist anymore because everyone is just so much better than they used to be.
“Like, in the ’60s there were bad guitar solos. You would find them in pop songs, where you’d go, ‘Urgh! Nice try. Next!’ But that’s the past, and that’s a good thing.”
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“I love watching technique, but if I had to be put in a situation like that where I had a pressure to play a certain way all the time, I would be bummed out! I want to be able to play however the fuck I want to play, and I want to be able to improvise when I want to improvise. And I want to play for the song because I am part of a package. It doesn’t begin with me and it doesn’t end with me.”
72 Seasons is out now via Rhino/Blackened Recordings.
Jonathan Horsley has been writing about guitars since 2005, playing them since 1990, and regularly contributes to publications including Guitar World, MusicRadar and Total Guitar. He uses Jazz III nylon picks, 10s during the week, 9s at the weekend, and shamefully still struggles with rhythm figure one of Van Halen’s Panama.
