Kirk Hammett has long been a champion of Sweden’s tech-metal punishers, Meshuggah. When the Metallica guitarist first heard the band by sticking on their 2002 album Nothing, he quickly put out a press release declaring, “I love Meshuggah!” (he also compared their music to the then-upcoming St Anger – yeah, sure, Kirk). Then, in 2015, Kirk extended that support even further by not just booking Meshuggah for his annual horror festival, Kirk Von Hammett’s Fear Festevil, but appearing with them onstage.
During Meshuggah’s performance of their mammoth single Bleed, Kirk rocked up to take the guitar solo. Mr “Von Hammett” took the part in a different direction to Meshuggah’s own Fredrik Thordendal, indulging in dollops of his signature wah pedal, but the result was still perfectly abrasive for a song so unrepentantly heavy. Watch the footage of him shredding below.
Kirk later commented on the experience and again tipped his hat to Meshuggah in a SiriusXM radio interview. “I could feel the power behind me,” he said. “It was kind of like being in front of a locomotive and the only way to keep in front of that locomotive is to just play my ass off and keep up with it. I’ve jammed with a lot of people and I’ve jammed with a lot of bands, but that was so unique. It was amazingly powerful and an amazing experience.”
Both Metallica and Meshuggah are currently touring to promote new albums. While the Swedes are rampaging their way through North America off the back of last year’s Immutable, the Four Horsemen are gearing up to continue their 72 Seasons tour with a string of European shows in May. The dates will see the band play two separate nights at every city they visit, with no repeated songs across the four hours of live music.
