We revisit METALLICA’S Garage Inc. album, with the help of the original artists.

We revisit the songs on Metallica’s covers album that introduced a generation to metal and punk’s founding fathers

In the autumn of Metallica, 1998, after a three-album run of Load and Reload had seen them evolve from thrash metal’s greatest band to an arena rock behemoth, Metallica set about doing what they do best: blindsiding everyone with something completely unexpected. “Metallica still needs to have fun,” Lars Ulrich told Billboard that November. “We made three pretty serious albums in a row. It was time to do something different.” Released on November 23 of that year, that “something” turned out to be Garage Inc – a monstrous double-disc collection of covers of seminal rock and metal songs that had inspired the Four Horsemen over the years. While the second disc was a smorgasbord of B-sides from various Metallica releases across their career, the first was a brand new collection of fresh takes on timeless classics. We dissect that colossal first half – with a little help from some of the bands who inspired it.