Metallica Unveil "Death Magnetic" Cover

Yesterday, Metallica unveiled the remarkably subtle cover art for its forthcoming album, Death Magnetic. We see shards of metal arranged in a curious pattern, as if by some natural force, creating a shape that looks almost like a coffin — but what does it symbolize? As always, Metallica keeps us guessing.

In an interview with Norwegian television this week, frontman James Hetfield pontificated on the dense similes the album's title is built upon. "It started out as kind of a tribute to people that have fallen in our business, like Layne Staley. Some people are drawn towards [death], just like a magnet, and other people are afraid of it and push away."

Rock Daily will take the rest of the day off to turn on the black light and really think about that one, though we have to admit that this cover is not nearly as badass as Kill 'Em All or Master of Puppets but is head and shoulders above Load and Reload.

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Song Stories

“Piano Man”

Billy Joel | 1973

Billy Joel’s first hit, “Piano Man,” was – ironically – an autobiographical lament about how his first album wasn’t a hit. When Cold Spring Harbor didn’t take off, Joel briefly became a lounge pianist in Los Angeles, and this song, about that experience, expressed his frustrations and fears at the time: “And they sit at the bar and put bread in my jar/And say, ‘Man, what are you doing here?’” “It was all right,” Joel said later, about the gig. “I got free drinks and union scale, which was the first steady money I’d made in a long time.”

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