Metallica are planning to release their latest album later this year.
The heavy metal group’s 10th album will arrive on October 14, German newspaper Bild reports. The release date has not been confirmed by Universal Records.
Frontman James Hetfield has, however, confirmed that the record is nearing completion. “We’re mixing it now, so hopefully by fall it’ll be out and hitting people’s ears,” he told Loudwire last month. “We’re super stoked about it. It’s been a long time coming, and, you know, this is what we do. We love playing, and the next album is exactly what it’s supposed to be, so we’re excited about it.”
Fans have been waiting eight years for a follow-up to the group’s last album ‘Death Magnetic’, the longest gap between studio albums in the band’s history.
Metallica’s drummer Lars Ulrich recently suggested that family commitments had made finding time to record more difficult.
“I think what’s happened is our families and our domestic responsibilities are so important to us now, so we just have a new model,” he told Citizens of Humanity magazine. “We’re sort of constantly doing something but never to the point of the needle going in the red, but Metallica really hasn’t sort of shut down since around 2005, and it’s a model that works for us.”