Metallica To Delay Their ‘Pink Floyd’ Tour?

Metallica’s plans to stage a show to rival Pink Floyd’s The Wall may be on hold following the success of the recent Sonisphere festivals featuring thrash metal’s Big Four.

Earlier this year, in March, Metallica manager Peter Mensch told Classic Rock the band had a major surprise lined up for 2011.

“Let’s just say that next year you will see a Metallica tour that will blow your mind,” Mensch said.

“They will only play in 10 cities but it will be a huge undertaking. It will be Metallica’s equivalent of The Wall.”

However, Lars Ulrich now tells Classic Rock that further Big Four shows – featuring Metallica along with Slayer, Megadeth and Anthrax – could be in the offing.

“There’s a lot of exciting things that happen in the mind of Peter Mensch and sometimes they’re not easily understandable by the people who surround him,” the Metallica drummer chuckled.

“But the vibe on this thing [the Big Four tour] is so big, we’d be stupid to ignore it. You know on your iPhone, you can move the weather maps up and down? Well, the Big Four is quickly moving up to the top in terms of potential occurrences for the next couple of years.”

Even so, the success of the Big Four doesn’t mean Metallica have completely abandoned their own large-scale touring plans.

“We have been kicking some ideas around about doing some stuff that – how shall I say it – is pretty theatrical,” the tub-thumper confirmed.

“In the early years, before we started playing in the round, which we did on the Black Album, we were obviously inspired by the huge scale of Iron Maiden’s shows and so on.

“The idea would be for us to, potentially, try something theatrical again. It might be a bit of a nod to some of the different things that we’ve done such as the …And Justice For All tour, with the statue of Lady Justice that collapsed at the end of each show.

“We might incorporate a lot of different ideas, instead of it being one particular thing. It would be a multitude of theatrical elements, maybe as an idea for a one-off tour or something.”

But foremost in Ulrich’s mind at the moment is enjoying some well-earned time off.

“We started in May 2008, so we’ve got to go and lie down pretty soon! We’ve got three runs out in Australia, Japan and New Zealand in the Fall, then we’re going to take a little bit of a breather because at that point we will have been two-and-a-half years on the road.

“So I would champion trying to do this [the Big Four tour] in 2011 or 2012, obviously in England and the United States. It’s just a matter of logistics. I don’t think there’s anybody involved who considers there’s a sell-by date on this.

“But here’s the stuff: on November 20^th my ass is going home. I’m going to sit at home, and I know the other fellas in the band are gong to do the same thing. I would say we’re going to take at least six months off and do nothing, and then at some point in the spring or summer of 2011 we’ll start to figure out what to do next.”

On a different tack, Metallica have admitted that their controversial 2004 documentary Some Kind Of Monster may have been a mistake.

The documentary showed the band working – or not – on their disastrous 2001 album St. Anger. It involved a therapist who wanted to be a producer, constant arguments between Lars Ulrich and James Hetfield, and a confrontation between the drummer and Dave Mustaine.

Now Ulrich has admitted to the Herald Sun in Australia: “That thing has taken on a life of its own. I had to live that shit for three fucking years! The whole thing was a mindfuck. I am aware a lot of other musicians seem to have lived a lot of those moments. They weren’t necessarily stupid enough to film them like we were and share them with the rest of the world.”