James Hetfield Tells Metallica’s Sphere Crowd the Band Is Not There to “Influence You”

James Hetfield used Metallica’s Saturday night set at Sphere in Las Vegas to put distance between his band and entertainers who, as he put it, are there “to influence you with their bullshit.” He did not name anyone. He did not have to.

The remark lands inside a dispute that has run since Labor Day weekend, when Macklemore used his opening sets on Ed Sheeran’s New Jersey dates to speak about Palestine. Macklemore was removed from the tour within days, after Israeli groups protested and Robert Kraft rallied stadium owners against him. Sheeran issued a statement acknowledging both sides, and his backing band and remaining opening acts then quit. When he returned to the stage, he said his shows should be a place where people escape the world rather than argue about it.

Hetfield’s version is blunter. He thanked the crowd for the time and money they spent to be there, told them to forget the outside, and summarized Metallica’s agenda as “love, energy, and heavy music.”

The tension is in the catalogue. Metallica has spent decades writing about war, state violence, and what both cost, and has worked with veterans. A band with those songs can still decide the stage is not a podium. Saying so out loud, though, turns it into a position of its own, and one aimed at a peer who chose differently.