Robert Trujillo is ready to step up and sing for Metallica again if they need him to.
The 59-year-old bassist had his first “official semi-solo vocal” on ‘You Must Burn!’ on the group’s latest album ’72 Seasons’ and while he didn’t realise that’s what he’d be doing on the track, he’s happy to repeat the process again in the future.
He told Metal Hammer magazine: “I’m always there for what the band need!
“I was expecting to just do gang vocal-type things, adding a bit of texture and presence to the recording, but I didn’t realise I’d get a semi-solo moment!
“I always do my best whatever I’m asked to though, man, and these are the moments you can cherish.”
2023 saw the group embark on their hugely ambitious ‘M72’ world tour – which saw the group play two shows in each destination, with a different setlist every night – and the ‘Enter Sandman’ rocker admitted it was “really challenging” to pull things together how they wanted to, but they were delighted with the results.
He said: “Taking that record out on the road with this enormous stage and basically docking in each city was really challenging but I think we found our stride with it.
“You need to figure out how to work out different terrains, especially given how big the stage is and how huge the Snake Pit is.
“It was like, ‘How do we connect with our fans the way we want to?’ Thankfully, we still did.”
And Rob and bandmate Kirk Hammett had fun composing a song for each venue on the tour.
He said: “Kirk and I would have these moments where we’d write a song for each city -an instrumental – and oftentimes that would be just me and him rehearsing in a vehicle on the way to a venue, coming up with a two-minute song that we put together.
“It could be punk-influenced, funk, speed metal… There’s a lot of cool little gems that’ve contributed to this live show.”