Metallica's 11th Album: 10 Things Fans NEED To See

It really is a shame that Kirk Hammett hasn't gotten a fair shake on the past few releases. From no solos on St. Anger to losing a lot of his features on Hardwired, the man has gone from being a major contributor to just the guy to deliver a solo when the time calls for it.

Beneath all of the wah memes and fast runs though, there's a great creative mind aching to burst out.

While Death Magnetic showed the return of Kirk's soloing, the actual execution seems fairly mindless. Even though tracks like "All Nightmare Long" are amazing, the solo section seems too off-the-cuff coming from a player like Hammett. People forget that Metallica solos used to be something you could sing along to, from the tapping madness of "One" to the long drawn-out emotion of "The Unforgiven."

Whether it's the band stifling him or through Kirk's own style, the next solos could be something spectacular if they were worked out just a bit more.

It's gone down in legend about how hard Bob Rock was on Kirk to get the solo for "The Unforgiven" to tape. While it might not mean pissing him off, these new songs would be something else entirely if Hammett brought his fretboard fire.