Not sure about Metallica these days...
But I was a fan in years gone by. I reckon they went downhill after '...And Justice For All', but that's just my opinion. Nowadays, bands like Five Finger Death Punch and Hatebreed are more to my taste.

It's not that metalheads love their genre to the exclusion of all else, more that metal in general is the most under-represented type of music in the UK, so we tend to be a bit protective, maybe possessive about it.

I was (at the age of ten) a serious fan of Kate Bush, I then got into Siouxsie & The Banshees, then Marillion, then Iron Maiden and finally just came clean as a metalhead. (Though I do enjoy a bit of trance for the times when I'm driving on night shift, and Astral Projection are old friends here.)

I still play Kate's stuff, and in the last two years years I have been to see Tori Amos, The Blockheads, Ray LaMontagne, Carter USM, Dr. Feelgood and a Rossini recital in between the metal gigs.

Right now the missus is playing Goldfrapp and I ain't complaining. So long as some thought has gone into it and it's done well, I can live with pretty much anything, music-wise.

Except fucking 'gangsta' rap. And free-form jazz. Oh, and U2.

Especially U2...
(Billy The Fish wants to gargle with Lucy Pinder's bath water, Mon 3 Jan 2011, 9:22, 1 reply)

The Blockheads and Dr Feelgood?
Have you got a thing for bands with dead lead singers?
Still, excellent choice.
( wotofco pissing in your swimming pool, Mon 3 Jan 2011, 9:33, closed)

Both have evolved and polished their sets over many years.
Dr. Feelgood especially.

And Derek The Draw is a great frontman for The Blockheads - easily as entertaining as Dury, who was in his 'bitter and twisted' mode on the only occasion that I saw him...
(Billy The Fish wants to gargle with Lucy Pinder's bath water, Mon 3 Jan 2011, 13:50, closed)

I had a chat with Derek last year
on Kilburn High Road, funnily enough.
Dunno about the modern day Feelgoods though, no original members and all that, better off going to see Wilko play.
( wotofco pissing in your swimming pool, Mon 3 Jan 2011, 15:59, closed)