Metallica is set to begin production rehearsals for their latest tour on Monday in San Francisco, the tour kicks off on October 21st in Arizona. According to drummer Lars Ulrich the band will play “a lot of new songs” from “Death Magnetic” on this tour.

The band has not toured the US for quite some time. When they’ve toured on new albums in the past they’ve been pretty conservative when playing new songs. Ulrich explains…

“These new songs are a lot of fun to play,” Ulrich tells Billboard.com. “Traditionally I think we’ve been a little conservative when we’ve started off with two songs, three songs (from the new album). We’re going to hit the ground running here. We’re probably gonna learn all of them and play, I hope, at least five a night and probably rotate ‘em so we get a lot of new songs in. That’s one thing I’m definite about.”

One of the reasons the band is so keen to play the new material is because its been heralded by fans and critics as a return to form. “Death Magnetic” has already sold almost 3 million copies worldwide and over 1 million in the US alone.

“It’s just an overwhelming, positive thing,”. “You couldn’t have told me a month ago or six months ago that we would have a record that would be this well-received. It seems like it’s so universal this time and it’s all over the world and everybody’s so into it on so many different levels — the fans, press, the peers … everybody.”

The band’s stage setup will be “in the round” once again but different from previous tours, involving a huge, moving lighting rig above the band.

I remember seeing footage of the band during the Black Album era and I believe they’ve been playing “in the round” since then. I recently checked out even older Metallica videos on YouTube and was surprised to see Kirk Hammett playing a lot of Ibanez guitars. Regardless of what guitars they’re playing this time around, its the first time I’ve personally wanted to see a Metallica concert in a long while because I think some of the new material is great.

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Metallica just played two of England’s biggest rock festivals, Reading and Leeds. A live soundboard version of their new single “The Day That Never Comes” from Leeds is available online via YouTube. The band’s “MetClub” series lets fans download soundboard versions of live shows for a fee, this one apparently leaked to youtube.

The sound of the song is a little muddier than the studio version, but overall it’s decent. From what I’ve seen it appears James Hetfield has been playing a lot of Gibson Explorers and also Les Pauls recently. I personally like the way these sound a lot more than the ESP’s he plays a lot. The structure of the song is kind of dangerously close to the band’s classic track “One” but its probably better than most of the tracks currently on Modern Rock radio.

Metallica haven’t even revealed the artwork for their forthcoming album “Death Magnetic” but they have already announced a deluxe coffin-style package. What? You ask, well here’s the info…

“In addition to the album, the package will include a disc of demos, a behind-the-scenes DVD chronicling the making of “Death Magnetic,” a T-shirt, a flag, guitar picks and a poster.

Also featured is a Metallica credit card with a code redeemable for a download of a “special European show happening in September.” This edition is only available from the band’s Web site.”

This is a cool idea on the bands part, if not a little extraneous. Although it makes a lot of sense, as I’m sure a lot of you out there, are still sticking with Metallica and would like to get extra stuff from the band. It is also worth noting that the band is including guitar picks in the package, as I’m sure they know a lot of their fans are guitar players themselves.

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