We know we've said this before, but this time it seems like we really won't have to wait much longer for Metallica's follow-up to 2008's Death Magnetic. In a new interview, Lars Ulrich says that next month is when the group will reconvene to put the finishing touches on the record.

“We’re now coming towards the end of the musical creative process and we’re starting to look ahead and the process of how we’re gonna share this record with the universe,” he told Metal Forces. “The month of June is basically when we’re gonna sit down and figure what we’re gonna do with it all; what we’re gonna call it and what’s gonna be on it."

Despite the delay, Metallica haven't been unproductive since Death Magnetic. Five years ago, they released Lulu, a collaboration with Lou Reed, and 2013 saw them branch out into film-making with Metallica Through the Never, which combined a Metallica concert with a narrative story. And they've also toured very frequently, which a pair of experts said last year was largely to help recoup the money they lost on the movie and the two Orion Festivals. A new song, "Lords of Summer," was premiered in 2014.

Now, with virtually nothing on their tour calendar, they can channel their energy into the new record, so that, as Ulrich added, “If the record doesn’t come out this year then it won’t be because it’s not done. It will be because there’s some sort of cosmic reason that it would be smarter to hold onto it until next year. But the record will be done this summer."

The group are working again with Greg Fidelman, who engineered both Lulu and Death Magnetic. “Greg Fidelman is 24/7 on this record and has been since last summer,” Ulrich said. “He’s doing an insanely great job and has been putting his heart and soul in it pretty much every waking moment of his life in helping us engineer and produce this record."

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