Metallica's Lars Ulrich talks to Scott Kara about the band reaching another significant milestone.
Lars Ulrich doesn't want to be reminded that Metallica will be 30 years old next year.
"Don't say it. Don't say it," he says, laughing.
He's kidding, kind of, because despite the ups and downs Metallica have had in the three decades since Ulrich placed an ad in a Los Angeles newspaper and hooked up with guitarist and singer James Hetfield, life inside the world's biggest metal band is better than ever.
"Pretty hunky-dory" is how Ulrich, the band's co-founder and drummer, describes the mighty Metallica machine.
"Everybody's playing nice and we've found a way in the last couple of years to balance family and Metallica.
"And we've finally solved the riddle of how long to stay on the road so we don't jump off the deep end."
Ulrich is in a pokey backstage dressing room before the band's Christchurch shows.
There's a massage table ("Sometimes a few of the body parts need a little bit of a repair") and an abundance of protein drinks ("a few years ago it would have been very different").
Ulrich, a Dane who moved to Los Angeles when he was 17 to train for a blossoming tennis career before he ended up playing drums, has a reputation as a bit of a big mouth.
Yes, the 46-year-old can talk, but he's a likeable and forthcoming chap.
He's a proud family man. But what strikes you most is his passion for music.
He watches videos of Deep Purple almost every day on his iPad; on his iPod of late he's been listening to Bachman Turner Overdrive and Status Quo; and says music is what he knows best and where "I dwell".
"It's my comfort zone. It gets me fired up, and to be able to make it your life for 30 years it's pretty amazing."
And while Metallica might be a multimillion-dollar business, Ulrich says these days it's all about the music.
"When you strip all the nonsense away - all the hotel suites, the private planes, and all the hooplah - it's just four guys who really love to play music together."
It's especially satisfying these days now that they are getting on well.
He sounds genuinely chuffed and amazed when he says the four of them went out for dinner together the previous night.
"It's kind of ... I don't think pathetic is the word," he laughs, "but there is an underlying sweetness to the whole thing now.
Everything's cool. Everybody's getting along. We're having a good time. It's stress free."
But as revealed on access-all-areas documentary, Some Kind Of Monster from 2004, which documented the tumultuous time around the recording of Metallica's 2003 album St Anger, it wasn't always so happy.
Hetfield had addiction issues, long-time bass player Jason Newsted had left the band, and there was plenty of niggle, soul-searching, and - the bit that made the film so intriguing - band counselling sessions with therapist Phil Towle.
Watching these sessions you couldn't help but feel the band were being a little melodramatic and, well, a little cracked.
It was hardly heavy metal, let alone rock'n'roll.
Ulrich stands by the sessions and what came out of them.
"A lot of the ground work of what's going on now was laid during those years. It was rough.
"We had to re-evaluate, reconnect, and James had to deal with some things he had to deal with.
"And Phil said that during all those dark years, all the work would probably not manifest itself, or come to fruition until the next record, and he was right."
He admits St Anger - a clangy and difficult-sounding album - was not the record they hoped it would be.
"It obviously felt right at the time but it was a peculiar record."
However, during the St Anger round-the-world jaunt Ulrich says things between the bandmates started to settle down.
They took time off following the tour and when it came time to start writing for latest album Death Magnetic everything was at peace.
"There was a new serenity in the ranks."
Lowdown
Who: Metallica
Essential albums: Kill Em All (1983); Ride The Lightning (1984); Master of Puppets (1986); ... And Justice For All (1988); Metallica (1991); Death Magnetic (2008).
