10 Greatest Metallica Riffs EVER
The twisted mind of Hetfield.
Whenever you talk about metal, it always comes back to Metallica. From the loose groove of Lars Ulrich's drumming to the rapid pace of nearly every single song, these thrash titans have made an entire career out of exploring every single facet of heavy music that they can. However, if you had to distill the strength of Metallica into a single entity, it would have to be their guitar riffs.
Ever since the group's inception in the Bay Area during the '80s, James Hetfield was a practical riff factory, with every single song being a showcase of his technique. Sometimes they would sound bright, sometimes they would be twisted, and yet all of them fell right into place whenever it was paired with the rest of the band. Across every single album, there have plenty of good riffs sprinkled throughout.
Even though Hetfield gets brought up as the heart of the band, some of these riffs only got enhanced due to the others' contributions, whether it be Kirk Hammett or even Lars (yes, Lars) delivering his almighty wisdom to the equation.
There have been plenty of badass riffs from the thrash genre over the years, but these are the riffs that have enough punch to be an entire wrecking ball.
10. Enter Sandman
Come on...how could you not have a Metallica riff contest and not include Enter Sandman? Granted, over the years the song's overplay have led many die-hard fans to classify it as one of the worst songs Metallica has to offer. Even so, there is something that draws you in that makes you want to experience this song again for the 2000th time.
Using the devil's interval of music, the riff starts off almost bluesy before Lars' drums kick in to bring the riff to its fullest potential. For as classic as a riff this is, it's weird that it actually wasn't written by James Hetfield. When originally coming up with demos for the Black Album, this track turned up on Kirk Hammett's playlist, albeit in a more abbreviated form than the classic we know today.
Though it would be easy to say that it didn't become classic until Hetfield came in, the real mastermind was Lars Ulrich, who suggested that they use the more classic pattern that we know today of 3X1. You can tell that these guys knew they had something special on their hands, seeing how it's one of the only songs in their discography to be based around one lick moved around the fretboard.
While many will contest how much it's overplayed, there's a reason why this song has won over as many fans as it has back in the day.