Metallica has "too many ideas" for new album says Robert Trujillo

Metallica may be celebrating its 40th anniversary later this year, but guitarist Kirk Hammett isn't looking at the festivities as a victory lap: the band has a lot left in the tank.

Hammett and Robert Trujillo recently joined NBC Sports' George Kontos on Giants Postgame to address this landmark year in Metallica history. Hammett, who joined Metallica in 1982, said the decades have "passed so quickly. It's amazing."

He continued, noting that the band has as much ambition as ever: "What's truly amazing now is the fact that I still feel like we haven't really peaked, we're still real hungry, we still wanna make music, we still care about music, we still care about each other. I don't see any signs of us slowing down, man, 'cause we have stuff that we wanna do."

Despite the pandemic shutdowns and the postponement of their 2020 touring plans, Metallica has kept busy, workshopping new music and preparing new releases and content for fans.

Trujillo, who joined Metallica in 2003, echoed Hammett's sentiment, saying he's impressed with his bandmates' vitality this far into their career.

"A lot of times when bands have been around that long, there is a shortage — people run out of ideas — and we have the opposite problem; we've got too many ideas," the bassist said. "So it's a good problem to have."

Frontman James Hetfield said this past May that the band had about 10 songs in various stages of development, with no timetable for the next album release.

Earlier this month, Metallica announced that it would hold a 40th anniversary celebration over two nights this December at the Chase Center in San Francisco. Tickets will be limited to only members of Metallica's Fifth Member fan club.

In September, the band will release the highly-anticipated 30th anniversary edition of the Black Album, plus the Metallica Blacklist covers compilation for charity.