![\"metallica](\"https:\/\/www.capitalfm.co.ke\/lifestyle\/files\/2015\/12\/metallica-album-christmas.jpg\")
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Metallica, one of the most influential acts in heavy metal, has hinted that a new album is getting closer after a gap of nearly a decade.<\/p>\n
In a holiday video sent to Metallica fans, frontman James Hetfield offered season’s greetings from inside a studio before guiding the paws of his cat to hit play on a recording.<\/p>\n
Fans had the chance to listen to 15 seconds of unmistakable Metallica with a thrashing rhythm guitar line and an indecipherable lyric in Hetfield’s raspy voice.<\/p>\n
The video, sent to fans on Tuesday, immediately renewed speculation that a new Metallica album will come soon — the first since 2008’s “Death Magnetic.”<\/p>\n
When Metallica played in Canada in September, drummer Lars Ulrich told Le Journal de Quebec that the new album would come out in mid-2016.<\/p>\n
But lead guitarist Kirk Hammett later told Buffalo, New York radio station WEDG that the album could “at the very worst” arrive in early 2017.<\/p>\n
He said the album would be along the lines of “Death Magnetic,” which was considered a return to Metallica’s heavy roots after periods of experimentation.<\/p>\n
Metallica in the 1980s helped create the thrash metal genre, known for its aggression and focus on musicality as opposed to the more flamboyant and pop-influenced glam metal acts.<\/p>\n
The California-based band has only one show scheduled in 2016 — a concert in San Francisco on the eve of the city’s turn hosting the Super Bowl, American football’s championship game.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Metallica, one of the most influential acts in heavy metal, has hinted that a new album is getting closer after a gap of nearly a decade. In a holiday video sent to Metallica fans, frontman James Hetfield offered season’s greetings from inside a studio before guiding the paws of his cat to hit play on a recording. Fans had the chance to listen to 15… <\/p>\n