Metallica’s James Hetfield has unveiled a spoken-word version of classic Yuletide story A Visit From St Nicholas – aka, ’Twas The Night Before Christmas.
Papa Het’s version of the 1823 poem dropped on Metallica’s own SiriusXM channel Maximum Metallica, with the message: “Grab your cocoa and settle in by the fire before your long winter’s nap for a reading of ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas by Papa Het.”
An animated video subsequently appeared on YouTube, with Papa Het narrating the poem over a suitably festival image of a crackling fire and Christmas stockings.
As unlikely as it seems, the new version of this Yuletide chestnut is surprisingly faithful, though hearing the man who once sang Damage Inc. intoning the line ‘While visions of sugar-plums danced in their heads’ wasn’t something we saw in the tea leaves at the start of the year.
Check out the full video below.
