Metallica's Kirk Hammett is making most of his time off. The legendary guitarist has revealed on social media he's working on some new riffs.
"Things are most definitely not business-as-usual, but I’m good, staying safe, working on riffs … hope you are all okay out there as well," Kirk posted on Instagram with a quick Boomerang of his fretboard.
Kirk has been home since last fall, when James Hetfield entered rehab for addiction treatment.
In an interview with Cosmo Music in October, Hammett said he has tons of "really kick-ass, great material" for a new Metallica record. He doesn't say exactly where he's storing all that material right now, but I'd imagine there's a few backups in place this time.
"I have a lot of stuff written that I've put aside for the band — a lot of stuff. Because last album, I didn't have any stuff, 'cause I lost most of my ideas when I lost my phone — over 500 musical ideas… It took me a long time to recover from that. And I got it into my head I had to produce twice as much — basically, I overcompensated. So, as it stands, as we speak, I have a lot of material — really kick-ass, great material — that I just can't wait to show the other guys and turn into some music, record, get the album out and have more kick-ass metal."
Hopefully, Hammett has some backup mechanisms in place. Hammett was famously all prepared to contribute tons of riffs to Metallica's 2016 album Hardwired… To Self-Destruct. Then he lost his phone that had all the riffs on it and ultimately contributed nothing to the record. Seriously, Hammett has zero writing credits on all of Hardwired… To Self-Destruct.