Metallica bassist Rob Trujillo was pied in the face by Neil Young.
In a new interview with Louder Sound’s Classic Rock, the bassist discussed Metallica’s 2023. It has been 20 years since Trujillo joined the band, and to celebrate it, the band got a cake, as they always do in Trujillo’s words. But this year’s celebration was a little more unexpected. The rocker recalled:
“You know, man, more just a couple of big hugs. You know what, we always get cake! I get lost in the cake… you get caked on the face, a celebration could be you getting pied. The most surreal moment of my life was when Neil Young pied me.”
He further explained how it all occurred:
“It was my birthday and we were playing the Bridge School Benefit concert in San Francisco. I didn’t think I was gonna get pied that night and towards the end of the set, we’re doing a song with Neil, and who pies me first? Neil does. It was the last note of the set and that’s how it ended. I’m looking at him and it’s almost in slow motion, I just see a pie hit me in the grill!”
Metallica’s 2023
In 2023, Metallica released their long-awaited album, ’72 Seasons’, and embarked on a tour to match – the concept behind the M72 World Tour being that the band plays two shows in each city with no repeats in the setlist.
The bassist thinks 2023 has been a great year for them since they experimented a lot during the shows:
“It’s been great, because we’ve found our stride with this tour and this stage and what works and what doesn’t work and navigated the terrain, so to speak. Even last night at rehearsal, it feels like we’re really pretty tight right now. We’ve tried different things and experimented with the setlist and we’re having a lot of fun. We’re even doing it now where Kirk and I go up and do a duet song that we’ve prepared literally a day or two before.”
The band has also celebrated the 40th anniversary of their debut album ‘Kill ‘Em All’ in 2023. Having contributed to six albums since his join, apparently, he hoped to play some of the oldest songs and tracks from ‘Kill ‘Em All.’ Instead, they played tracks such as ‘Dyers Eve’ and some tracks that has never been played live.
What Trujillo Could Not Do In 2023
It seems as if 2023 has been a great year for the rocker, and perhaps he reached everything he hoped for in 2023 when it comes to music. When asked what he could not achieve in 2023, Trujillo listed a few things, all of which are non-music related:
“Yeah. I’ve got these storage lockers in LA that are just out of control. There’s years and years of stuff in there that I had planned on going in there and organising everything and I haven’t had a chance to officially do that.”
He has even more stuff in mind to achieve:
“I also want to improve my Spanish. I started studying French and Spanish during the pandemic and I got to a certain place with my French, and then we basically got really busy with the band and I had to take a break on it. I feel like I need to bring language back into my life. That’s another goal, I want to get my French and my Spanish up to par.”
We hope 2024 will be a great year for them, too.
You can listen to ’72 Seasons’ below.
