It was on a tape that I made and like Lars just loved it. Hammett: “We haven’t really ever had a riff or part that has ever sounded like this. Hammett's solo incorporates a Chuck Berry/Angus Young rock ’n’ roll repeating lick, and after the solo he doubles the main riff in a higher octave. A groovy, single-note riff is, as Hammett says, unusual for Metallica, but sounds closer to their '90s output than anything before or since. The opening powerchords have the 5th in the bass, what Trujillo calls the “tension chords”, for an extra sinister crunch. I love the chromatic thing that goes completely down because no one does that!” 7. So I just went in there and did my Judas Priest and K.K. Trying to play a tricky melody when the band’s going all out – is that really appropriate? If I play a total noise solo, that’s gonna fit beautifully over what’s happening because what’s happening is already chaotic. Lux Æterna was fucking pedal to the metal, total adrenaline. Hammett: “When I step up to solo, I’ll listen to the song and say, ‘This one needs a total noise solo’, or ‘This needs a really melodic solo’. He immediately gets on the mic, ‘Robert! Are you playing this song with a pick?!’” When we first rehearsed it, I didn’t get a chance to warm up, so I tried to sneak a pick in there, thinking that our producer Greg Fidelman wouldn’t notice. Although I’m just pulsing on the A note, it’s a challenge, man. You’re getting pulverized, and there’s no time for a buildup – it’s just in! For me this one’s an arm burner. I love that the snare is in sync with our descending guitars. Hammett's whammy bar abuse riled his haters, but we’re with him – the noise solo works. You’ve heard this already, but it sounds even more frenetic coming after the plodding You Must Burn. Then all of a sudden it just punches you in the face with that riff.” 5. Trujillo: “In the descending part of the intro, James is covering that and I’m just on root notes and stabs on the descend. It sounds like Cheech and Chong in the lowrider cruising down Hollywood Boulevard, smoking joints.” Hammett: “There’s a lumbering feel to it. Before you even get to the riff you’ve got that scratch on the bass that sends this thing off. There’s a feeling of simplicity but the pulse takes you in a certain direction. It’s got that swagger and it’s not too fast. Trujillo: “I could see the comparison with Enter Sandman. The wah-fueled solo sees Kirk creating hooks with repeated rhythmic ideas, and the band sounds thunderous as they exit the solo into a half-time section. The four-on-the-floor intro and Trujillo’s bass riff, together with some excellent pickslides, build excitement for another riff that leans hard on the flat 5th. This is the first of a few songs that remind us of the band’s self-titled album from 1991 – known to all as ‘ The Black Album’. James and I will double up on those so we’re both hitting the strings as hard as we can but muting it so it becomes a percussive effect. It’s that classic Hetfield thrashing of the strings, and it’s something that you feel. Trujillo: “This track has an evil slide in it. We use the parallel 4ths a lot because it’s a dark sound without being too minor.” That wah pedal jumps and grabs you by the throat! The song really is a tribute to the New Wave Of British Heavy Metal that we still bow to even to this day. Hammett: “I just love this song, because right off the top I can just vomit out wacky wah pedal melodies. I just love this song, because right off the top I can just vomit out wacky wah pedal melodies. This is the first of many tracks to feature a memorable octave unison line between the guitars towards the end. The riff is in parallel 4ths, which makes it come on like a turbocharged Deep Purple. Metallica slow things down in the intro of this 200bpm, half-time shot of adrenalin. I like how there’s a descending sequence.” 3.

The accents play a role in that, and there are a lot of variations, too. It just has a lot of personality in that evil range. Trujillo: “This does speak evil! This song has a lot of everything, but it definitely registers on the ‘evil tone’, the flat 5th. Someone said, ‘Hey, why don’t we come up with a Battery type of rhythm solo?’ So that’s what you hear right before the solo…'

Hammett: “ Shadows Follow falls in line with the second Metallica song on every album: usually mid-paced, super rhythmic and has a real driving quality to it. There is also an echo of Battery, the opening song from Metallica’s classic 1986 album Master Of Puppets.

Kirk’s doublestop licks in the solo speak of the Angus Young influence he tells us about, and he also performs some classic pull-offs onto open strings, another early AC/DC favourite. There’s a distinctly old-school Metallica vibe in Shadows Follow, with a riff that emphasises that most metal of intervals, the diminished 5th.

James hetfield guitar rig