Kirk Hammett has told the Alternative Press that Metallica has “pretty much” confirmed their new album will be with Greg Fidelman. Hammett went on to say: “We’re pretty much doing it with Greg Fidelman. He is in the mix. As far as what the final outcome will be, I don’t know. We have not brought in any [other] producer and it looks extremely [unlikely] we’d bring one in this late into the project.”
Hammett goes on to explain a bit more about Fidelman’s role in the process: “The title ‘producer’ itself is a bit ambiguous. It differs from person to person. You can call Rick Rubin a producer, but he’s not the [same] type of producer as Bob Rock, who is there for every note. At the same time, Rick Rubin gets stuff done. Greg Fidelman is a different type of producer in that he’s with the engineer always looking to try and move the project forward. And that’s different from, say, Dr. Dre, who is the type of producer who is actually making backing tracks, producing music, writing music. In the hip-hop world, Dre is a producer. It’s so ambiguous. If you go by the traditional term, we’re doing it with Greg, pretty much.”
Fidelman worked on Metallica’s last studio album, 2008’s Death Magnetic, and has worked with a huge variety of artists including; Adele, Black Sabbath, Slipknot and System of a Down. Metallica have been hinting at this new album for a long time, it’s now hoped to be out in late 2016, but who knows! It’s fast becoming metal’s Chinese Democracy.
