If you thought Metallica’s duet with Lady Gaga at Sunday’s Grammy Awards lacked a little in organization, you’re not alone — Lars Ulrich thought so too.
Metallica drummer Ulrich spoke to SiriusXM’s LA Daily on Tuesday, and characterized the duet — microphone malfunction and all — as a “clusterf–k.”
“From where I was sitting it was so chaotic — you know, firewalls and dancers, and James’ mic not working for the first verse — I mean, the whole thing was such a clusterf—,” Ulrich recalled.
The drummer went on to opine, however, that the chaos helped to elevate the energy of the performance.
“There was just this totally energetic, crazy — it was just energy and excitement and nuttiness,” Ulrich enthused. “So her [Gaga] right in my face just added to the whole exhilarating energy that was happening for those five minutes. it was awesome.”
While Ulrich hasn’t viewed the duet yet, the drummer said that he’s received “700 texts from people saying that the whole energetic chaos and the whole tornado-like energy of it really translated well on TV.”
As for why they didn’t just halt the glitch-addled performance and start again — as Adele did with her tribute to deceased former Wham frontman George Michael, Ulrich explained, “You really don’t have any choice other than to just keep battling on, it’s live television … when it’s technical, you don’t know, ‘wait, is it just in our ears onstage?’
“A couple of people [asked], like, ‘Why didn’t you just stop and start the song over?’ We didn’t know if there was a problem,” he continued. “It could have been that it worked fine out in the truck that was going to television, and it was just onstage. You never know.”
Listen to Ulrich’s interview below.