

"James was talking to me about the idea of what it would be like if you were in this situation where you were basically like a living consciousness, like a basket case kind of situation, where you couldn't reach out and communicate to anyone around you," Ulrich said in a filmed interview around the time of the album's release. It was back when Metallica were working on Master of Puppets that Hetfield was first struck with the theme that would grow into the song.
#Cliff burton skeleton sketch movie#
What's surprising is that the initial concept for the song predated the Metallica members' awareness that the book and movie even existed, and even predated the Justice sessions entirely. It's common knowledge that "One" was inspired by the book and movie Johnny Got His Gun, about a WWI soldier who wakes up to discover that he has become a prisoner in his own body after losing his arms, legs and entirely face to an artillery shell, and used clips from it for the song's music video. The concept behind "One" dates back to the writing of Master of Puppets the writing was pretty much me and James in the sweaty, shitty garage there on Carlson Boulevard."Ģ. "I think 'Blackened' came early, 'Harvester ' came early, 'One' came early. " sat down with our usual riff tapes and spent the fall of '87 holed up out at my rental house on Carlson Boulevard in El Cerrito," Ulrich recalled to Decibel in 2008. It was also in that same garage that most of Justice came together. They canceled SNL and their studio time, and once Hetfield recovered, they got back into shape by banging out the Garage Days Re-Revisited covers EP. Metallica were booked to start writing the follow-up to Master of Puppets in the spring of 1987, as well as to play Saturday Night Live, when James Hetfield broke his arm in a skateboarding accident. In continued appreciation of its nuances and innovation, here are 10 things you likely didn't know about Metallica's fourth studio album.ġ.And Justice for All was mostly written in the "Garage Days" garage of Lars Ulrich's house in El Cerrito And Justice for All is a verified classic and one of metal's most critical and influential offerings.

Is it the band's last great full-length? Or is it a bloated self-indulgence that necessitated the stripped-down move that followed with the " Black Album"? And what happened to Jason Newsted's bass? Decades later, these questions linger, but what is certain is that. Yet, the album continues to be controversial. On a commercial level, it was a huge breakthrough, marking their best-selling album at the time, their first Grammy Award and their first-ever music video, for the all-time classic song "One." And on a personal level, it represented a huge comeback after the devastating death of bassist Cliff Burton. On a thematic level, it stands as one of their most outraged, political and multi-layered statements. On a musical level, it remains their most complex, progressive and epic offering. And Justice for All was a huge album for Metallica.
