Metallica: ONE Overlooked Song On Every Album

From the time that Metallica started, James Hetfield was never really interested in writing dark lyrics for the hell of it. Outside of some of their earlier tracks like Jump in the Fire, there are only a handful of Metallica songs that make mention of any demons coming to tower over the Earth or anything. James was always into something that felt a little more real, and Trapped Under Ice felt like it was ripped straight out of a horror movie.

Much like the protagonist in the song One, this is a man who has woken up in the middle of a cryogenic sleep and no real hope of survival. Though he may have been fine when he was unconscious, all that he has at this point is to dream of going back to sleep or live the rest of his life frozen in this icy prison cell.

Outside of the great wordplay, the riff is unstoppable, being one of the first inclusions from Kirk Hammett on a Metallica album. It's also the riff that keeps on giving, with Kirk recycling this from an old song he wrote during his Exodus days, and Exodus themselves later reusing the riff on their song Impaler. Since this also came right after Fade to Black on Ride the Lightning, it was kind of like a security blanket for metalheads. We might be stretching out, but we haven't forgotten where we came from.