Watch Lars Ulrich Explain Why Flashy Drumming Is Overrated | Revolver

Watch Lars Ulrich Explain Why Flashy Drumming Is Overrated

"I've never been very interested in ability"

Later this year, Metallica will become the first metal band to receive a Polar Music Prize — the Swedish music award often referred to as "the Nobel Prize in Music." Ahead of the springtime ceremony, the band's drummer, Lars Ulrich, did an interview with the Polar Music Prize organizers, with topics ranging from his childhood influences and approach to playing drums, to what makes him tick creatively.

Asked to describe his "totally unique way of playing drums," Ulrich pointed to the band as a whole, rather than the instrument itself, as the basis for his thought process. "What's always the most interesting to me about drumming is, how do you fit the drums into what else is going on?" he mused. "How does it work [with] accents, and special hits, and things that make it more rhythmic, or more dynamic, or just add a kind of a physicality to it?

"I've never been very interested in ability," he added, adopting the tone of an an awestruck fan for sardonic effect. "'Oh, wow! This guy is so great!' – Yeah, he's so great, but it doesn't mean that he can make it swing, it doesn't mean that he can make it work within a group or a collective," the drummer said.

Ulrich pointed to his influences to prove his point. "As much as I grew up on people like Ian Paice from Deep Purple, who obviously has a lot of ability," he added, "I also love people like [AC/DC's] Phil Rudd and [the Rolling Stones'] Charlie Watts, who certainly [have] ability, but, I think, to a lot of purists — maybe not so much, because they're not as technical — but they have a different kind of ability that, to me, is as valuable and as precious and as important in that they make it swing, they make it move, [and] it gives it that physicality that it needs."

In other words, says Ulrich, showboating — and strict study — just aren't his style. "I've always just looked at drums as more of a group instrument," he explained. "I've never been very interested in playing drums by myself — you know, sitting down in the basement, practicing drum solos for hours at a time, that's not my thing. So being in a band, writing songs, making records, being part of a gang, being part of a band, that's always fascinated me."

Below, watch Metallica's epic performance of "Disposable Heroes" at the 2013 Golden Gods.