Even Metallica are Michael Jackson fans. For their encore at the Sonisphere Festival in Germany, the heavy metal titans played the memorable riff to Jackson's Beat It before paying a full-fledged tribute to Queen.
After the band slammed down a forceful portion of Beat It, a newly shorn James Hetfield said to the crowd, "That was a main influence on Kirk's guitar playing."
Whether he was referencing the riff itself or the fleet-fingered solo that Eddie Van Halen famously played on Michael Jackson's across-the-board smash isn't clear, but the performance was a timely gesture.
But they weren't done. Next, Hetfield said, "OK, here's a part where we play a song that's inspired us to play music from a band that we grew up listening to. Tonight, the chosen band is Queen."
And with that, Metallica sliced through a frenzied version of Queen's classic Stone Cold Crazy. The band covered the song for the1990 compilation album Rubaiyat - Elektra's 40th Anniversary; it would later appear as a b-side on the single Enter Sandman and again on their 1998 set Garage Inc. Which means they really, really like it!
Check out a fan-shot YouTube video below:
