Two of metal's coolest musicians – Metallica's Kirk Hammett and Ghost's Tobias Forge – sit down for a conversation about guitars, touring together and more.
In an awesome new video on Metallica's YouTube channel dubbed So What! A Spirited Chat with Kirk Hammett and Tobias Forge, two of metal's coolest musicians (and recent Kerrang! Award winners) sit down for a conversation about guitars, touring together and more.
Filmed while out on the road touring Europe as part of the WorldWired stadium tour, ’Tallica guitarist Kirk Hammett and Ghost frontman Tobias Forge praise each other's bands on this run, while Kirk also delves into his gig mindset and how he approaches every gig like it's his last.
On The Four Horsemen's decision to bring out Ghost as their main support, Kirk explains, "It's our honour – it really is. We all are big Ghost fans, and we want to put on the best possible show for our fans, and that means bringing out the best possible bands we can to play with us. We feel it's important to put on a very well-rounded show that offers a lot of different stuff, and you guys, your music and your show offers so much of a different sort of thing than we do. I think it works out really, really well."
To which Tobias responds: "Thank you! I can't really imagine anything more inspiring, and I think the set-up as well is really good for us because, even though we have opened up for you guys before over the years, I think that even though I can't really come up with a terrible situation, but not seldom when you are a small band and you come in and open up for a really big band, it can turn out to be a little daunting – especially if you are too new of a band and you're being thrown out of the nest, and you can't really fly! And, you know, if you lose 30 or 40,000 people, that's not cool. And I definitely think that now, coming in at this level for us, where we've done a few rounds, and we've gone to most of these places several times and we already have a crowd, it feels like there's enough people out there that are like, 'Yeah, I like what you do there.' You feel like, towards the end of the show when we're just about done, it feels like we've gathered at least a majority of the crowd, which is a very good thing. I think that you need to come in at a certain level to be, I guess, welcomed by the crowd."
"For me, whenever we play, it's a real event in my own head (laughs) – whether it's a small theatre, an arena, or a friggin' stadium with 47,000 people, in my mind it's just the biggest event, you know?" continues Kirk. "Walking out onstage, for me, in my mind, is an event. In my small little life of waking up, meditating, doing yoga, playing guitar and reading, and then X hours later walking out onstage to 47,000 people, in my mind that is a fucking event. And, at that point, it doesn't matter what anyone else is thinking, if they're thinking, 'It's a festival! It's a Metallica gig! It's an event! It's a fucking groundbreaking experience!' Whatever. In my mind I approach it like it's the last show I'm gonna play."
Watch the video below:
Metallica drummer Lars Ulrich also told Kerrang! of his love for Ghost, “To me, Tobias is a super-cool dude. I really like his energy and being around him. Everybody in our band is a huge fan of Ghost. It seems like the fans of our band love them too. With support bands, we always try to take out people we like to be around and get along with."
While, before the tour started, Tobias said. “Metallica are one of my favourite bands of all time, so I’ve had to sort of split myself in two. One half is the private Tobias Forge. He’s a big fan and has been since he was a kid. He’s a collector of all things Metallica! Then there’s the 37-year-old version of myself: the musician who’s effectively one of their colleagues.
“I guess you would say we are friends at this point. We’re on a talkative, texting basis. We try to stay in touch with each other. We are all very busy people, obviously, and we all have lives outside our jobs, so [contact] is very sporadic.
“We’ve played together in the past, but we’ve never gotten to go out on a night-after-night basis. I was very happy to be asked. I mean, holy shit! Imagine if I’d known that when I went to see them on the Black Album tour. Even my 22-year-old self would’ve – to paraphrase Lars Ulrich – been asking to share those drugs.”
