Billboard recently caught up with Metallica guitarist Kirk Hammett, digging deeper into his thought on the Trump presidency and dicussing the band's touring plans in support of their new album, Hardwired...To Self Destruct. An excerpt is available below.

Metallica is planning its return to the musical "battlefront" in 2017, riding the momentum of the chart-topping Hardwired...To Self-Destruct, its first new studio album in eight years. The quartet wraps up its 2016 itinerary with special small-venue benefits Thursday in Los Angeles and Saturday in Oakland, then heads overseas in January for shows in Asia, Europe and South America. Hammett promises the band "will be playing everywhere all over the world, running into 2018 undoubtedly" and is particularly excited about its first full-scale North American trek since 2009.

"It's been a long time since we've done a proper American tour," Hammett says. "We've done European tours, Asian tours, South American tours -- relatively recently -- but we have not done a proper American tour as of late, so we're very, very excited about it, and we're very excited to be able to do it playing new songs. So, yeah, America is definitely slated in there as well as all the usual places, too." A special stage has been designed for the tour, although Hammett is keeping mum on details. "It's gonna be really cool, really fun and very Metallica," he says.

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Two bass players walk into a hotel room.....one is Robert Trujillo, who, prior to joining Metallica, played with Suicidal Tendencies and Ozzy Osbourne. The other? Sam Dunn, formerly of Burn To Black and currently the guy on BangerTV who asks the deep questions. Sam and Rob sat down before Metallica's recent sold-out Opera House club show in Toronto to discuss Hardwired....to Self-Destruct, its killer track "Spit Out The Bone" and the role of bass in heavy metal music.