Rob Trujillo Speaks on Weird Things Ozzy Did to Musicians He Hired That He Was ‘Warned About,’ Names Song He Wishes Metallica Played More

Trujillo also singles out his proudest Metallica moment.

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During a conversation with MMA Junkie, Metallica bassist Rob Trujillo talked about Metallica, deep cuts, Ozzy Osbourne, the “doodle” jams from the metal giants’ 2019 European tour, and more.When asked, “What is your favorite deep cut you either wish to perform or have performed live?”, Trujillo replied (transcribed by UG):

“My favorite deep cut with Metallica is, by far, [1988’s] ‘The Frayed Ends of Sanity.’ That is a song I think we’ve played twice, maybe – not more than three times.

“We did play it a couple of times on tour, but it is a rarity, and that song is probably the craziest of the Metallica archive or catalog, and it is a deep cut.

“What I like about that particular song is that it has all the ingredients that I like about Metallica.

“It has the power grooves, the stuff that makes you headbang, but at the same time, it gets crazy in the middle section.

“Was it Lars talking about it, he’d probably somehow call it sort of ‘mathematical’ or whatever.

“It feels progressive like that, and that’s what I actually like about it because there’s something that’s loose and reckless, but at the same time it’s tight, so it has to be a conceived body of music in that section.

“‘The Frayed Ends of Sanity,’ that would be my deep-cut choice. I don’t know if we will play that one again, but I hope so. That’s the one for me right there.”

Do you have the proudest Metallica moment? Is there anything that stands out?

“Wow, that’s a tough one…

“For instance, I can remember my proud moment with Ozzy [Osbourne] – because I toured and played with Ozzy for a while [between 1996 and joining Metallica in 2003].

“And I remember it was Las Vegas, we had just played an amazing show, and I remember specifically, it think it was the [1971 Black Sabbath] song ‘Sweet Leaf.’

“And he and I started doing this dance together what ended up becoming the ‘crab walk.’ He would do all kinds of weird stuff – he’d pull your hair, scratch you, try to bite you, something weird.

“I was warned about this, and he would do that.

“So he comes over to me, and then I’m like, ‘OK…’ And I start kind of going lower and lower and lower, almost like a sumo wrestler.

“And all of a sudden I am like a foot from the ground. And guess what? He’s a foot from the ground too! And he’s like, ‘I got you!’ So that was surreal for me.

“Here’s a guy that I grew up listening to – obviously, with Black Sabbath, and then his solo material, and playing Ozzy’s music in backyard parties back when I was 16 years old – and now here I am, doing a crowd walk with this guy, on stage, in front of 18,000 people, in a sold-out arena.

“It was mindblowing.

“And with Metallica, there are so many moments, but I do have to say that some of my proudest moments were with Kirk [Hammett, guitar] on the last European tour.

“Playing in these massive soccer stadiums, and playing songs that were sorta native to these cities, or even those countries.

“We would take a song and learn it by an artist from that country. I’ll just give you one example: in Paris, France, we played a song [titled ‘Ma Gueule’] by an artist known as Johnny Hallyday.

“85,000 people, nobody knows what we’re going to play, kind of like street musicians, and Lars [Ulrich, drums] and James [Hetfield, vocals/guitar] are taking a break.

“We walk out there, he’s got his guitar, I got my bass, it’s almost like, ‘Where’s the hat? Where do they put the money?’ – literally like that, stripped-down, naked.

“And we get out there, we start playing the song, ‘Ma Gueule,’ and it’s by Johnny Hallyday. I’m telling you, people were in shock, but in a good way.

“It was tears and smiles, and it made the news, and there was a lot of this that happened through all the different countries and cities throughout Europe. We would choose an artist, cover that artist, and play that song, two-and-a-half minutes to three minutes.

“I’m singing in the [local native] language, so it gets really challenging. We’re talking Romania, we’re talking Poland, we’re talking Spain and Portugal, and Sweden…

“I sang in Swedish. That, to me, was one of the highlight moments of my entire existence as a musician, especially in Metallica, because I don’t even know if I could ever do that again.

“Sometimes I think about it, and I go, ‘Man, you were crazy, Kirk and I were crazy!’ That happened just before the pandemic, we were doing that in these football stadiums.

“So, there you go. Those were called doodles, these were the doodles, so the doodle moments overseas, huge for me, personally.”