Why does everyone make fun of Lars?

[River19]

Lars is the Stage Custom of Drummers.

I like Metallica, not necessarily anything "newer" but Ride the Lightening, Master, AJFA etc. were all enjoyable. Lars' drumming works for that band. I tend to separate "the person" from the music/drumming otherwise I think my list of great drummers would be much shorter as many musicians are "somewhat" flawed human beings.......so his off stage noise is what it is.

They have sold out stadiums literally for decades, I'm not sure Lars much cares about what we of the internet say about his drumming.

All that being said, the living meme that is Lars, is kinda funny......and his lightening rod personality attracts the criticism.

 

[pgm554]

Lars cheesed off a lot of folks because of Napster.
As for his chops ,basically the Charlie Watts of metal.
I ;like em despite of Lars being a cheese head.

 

[doggyd69b]

Lars main problem is he went bald-so Rock N Roll or metal isn't bald. It's just another crazy bias-like studies with good looking people. An ugly teacher could be a genius and a beautiful one a screaming idiot and the beauty wins. Lars turned bald and ugly-like Chris Walken had this baby face before becoming the Angel of Death. I'm glad I figured it out-something shallow.

People started to dislike him when he complained about Napster, and like I-P said he was right, but NO ONE is going to really admit that since it is easier to just hate on the guy. To be fair he is (or used to be) very full of himself and it showed in interviews, but to also be fair, Metallica does not sound the same with other drummers. (And by the same I mean good). They had Dave Lombardo as sub and Joey Jordison and sure, their set was killer but there is something about those constant tempo jumps that Lars does, (probably unintentionally) that for some reason just work for Metallica. Any other drummer would just stick to the tempo and not have those out of place crashes, but the songs would be much more linear and boring.. finally Lars was a huge part on building the structure of the songs in most Metallica songs. He didn't write the parts, but he had them arranged/shuffled to fit better and eventually become classics. As much as anyone just hates on the guy, he is (yes, still IS) one of the most successful drummers in history. And to all the haters, watch recent videos of his performances, he has gotten some of that spark back and has been playing very well lately, I guess decades of criticism got to him and he started to practice...

 

[mrjones]

To the bashers just start your own band .write your own drum parts and let's see how far you get .it's far easier to play a song and copy everything he did over and over till you have perfected it

 

[Infamous Beater]

Guys who haven't listened to much new music in the past 40 years like to fall back on "Lars is bad," but they're just showing how uninformed they are. Lame

 

[doggyd69b]

We can all agree that there is not a single band which is universally liked... That said, if any band has sold over 1 million records (or albums downloaded for the millennial folks), then said band regardless of your personal opinion is considered good (at least commercially good). We all know that the majority of people prefer simple music so bands that have musicians that can keep simple grooves are much more popular than bands that have musicians that are able to play more complex patterns. For example AC-DC vs Rush, in their wildest dreams would Rush imagine having half the fans that AC-DC has and it is not because Phil Rudd is an awesome drummer, don't get me wrong he does the job but then so does Lars....

 

[Mastiff]

To the bashers just start your own band .write your own drum parts and let's see how far you get .it's far easier to play a song and copy everything he did over and over till you have perfected it

My take: (a) The songs sound cool, (b) the drum parts are relatively simple by metal standards, but sound good with the songs, (c) I can't play most of Metallica's songs nor could I ever take Lars' place in shows. But, you can bet your ass I would be motivated as hell to practice and be the best I could possibly be if I had his platform. It's disappointing to see someone be blessed with such an opportunity and seem to just coast along and phone it in.

 

[someguy01]

It's disappointing to see someone be blessed with such an opportunity and seem to just coast along and phone it in.

100%
This where my disdain for him comes from, his utter disregard for his instrument.

 

[pibroch]

People make fun of Lars playing because they're morons - like sheep: bashing Lars is a "thing". It's an activity for the intellectually challenged and those amateur non-creative "musicians" who have nothing better to do.

 

[someguy01]

People make fun of Lars playing because they're morons - like sheep: bashing Lars is a "thing". It's an activity for the intellectually challenged and those amateur non-creative "musicians" who have nothing better to do.

Maybe read some of the responses as to why some of us have disdain for Mr. Ulrich before you come through blanketly insulting people you don't even know with what is also, an opinion.

 

[pibroch]

Maybe read some of the responses as to why some of us have disdain for Mr. Ulrich before you come through blanketly insulting people you don't even know with what is also, an opinion.

I have read you people's responses, hence my considered opinion above.

 

[someguy01]

I have read you people's responses, hence my considered opinion above.

Cool, so I'm an intellectually challenged moron because I can't stand the man. He was rude af to me the one time I met him and he's gone on record stating he doesn't practice and doesn't care to improve or build skills, which is a total disrespect for his instrument. He also had to be taught by a producer what a downbeat is, but hey he's beyond reproach in your world so I get insulted.
I bet you make lots of friends at parties.

 

[GetAgrippa]

I love Lars but I just love busting peoples chops. It's a sign I like you actually. I think I'm like Robin Williams in wanting to be a comedian but I'm not a comic genius. But still I'm hilarious to me-so I keep myself in stitches and even to tears. Hoo boy that's a good one Art-I say to myself. The really corny ones just make me slightly giggle-but I love corn pone humor being from the South.

 

[bermuda]

Not exactly a poke at Lars, but he's mentioned in Al's "Don't Download This Song" -

Don't download this song,
Even Lars Ulrich knows it's wrong,
Go and buy the CD, like you know that you should,
Oh don't download this song.

 

[GetAgrippa]

 

[C. Dave Run]

Even Lars Ulrich knows it's wrong

This is a spectacular backhanded compliment!

 

[Mediocrefunkybeat]

People make fun of Lars playing because they're morons - like sheep: bashing Lars is a "thing". It's an activity for the intellectually challenged and those amateur non-creative "musicians" who have nothing better to do.

I disagree and I'm a big Metallica fan.

Lars up around the Black Album was a decent drummer. He relied on the studio more than others but there's no denying that he could play, play hard and play with a unique style. the '89 Justice Tour videos bear that out. Then he stopped improving and it would appear, stop practicing. His cymbal tone (live) has been horrible since at least 1991, his live snare always sounds terrible and his ability to play around the kit is, at times, amateurish. There is no hand-foot interplay in his fills, his timing isn't the best and until a few years ago barely bothered with his double bass drums, instead re-arranging the songs or just not playing them when they could get away with it.

He's got a lot better in the last four or five years and the live footage shows that he has hugely improved again. He's found some of the old magic. It's not the same as it was up until about 1991 - but he can play.

Compare that with his peers (I'm thinking specifically of Dave Lombardo) and he never, ever let his playing slacken. Download 2003, when he stood in for Lars is an absolute revelation. I've never heard Battery played better. Lombardo practiced, got involved with new things and still maintains his unique style. Is he the most technically gifted metal drummer? Absolutely not. There are many now that trounce him - but for sheer intensity, nobody can better Dave Lombardo.

Why did I choose Lombardo? Partly because they were in the same scene at the same time but also because Lombardo is only a year younger than Lars. So you can't accuse Lars of losing his touch because of age, either.

Lars will never be as good as he was from 84-91 again. Lombardo just gets better and better. The difference? Work ethic.

 

[DrumEatDrum]

there's no denying that he could play, play hard and play with a unique style. the '89 Justice Tour videos bear that out

Lars will never be as good as he was from 84-91 again. ....The difference? Work ethic.

I was at one of the Justice shows in 89. At the time it was a religious experience. It was like Lars had been dropped here from another planet.
regardless of "better", he was just so different at the time. No one played like him.

And when the Justice album came out on September 7, 1988, and the video for "One" was played on MTV most people had never seen or heard double bass work like that.

Sure, there were other players out there, but Deen Castronovo, Scott Travis, Vinnie Paul, and others were still on small obscure record labels at the time.

Painkiller wouldn't be released until September 1990. Cowboys from Hell didn't come out until July 24, 1990, and didn't really begin to become popular until 19992.

Even the great Tommy Aldrige was better known as the guy in the Whitesnake videos, while his best double bass work was often on smaller lesser-known albums like his Project Driver album. And even though MTV was full of double bass kits, it's not like you heard much double bass in the hit songs of Motley Crue, Scorpions, Dokken, whomever...

It could be argued if not for the success Lars had with "One" that MTV might not have even bothered playing videos from heavier bands.

Whereas now, you almost can't find a metal song that doesn't have mind-bending double pass work. The bar has been raised so high that what would have been considered a drummer you have to hear in 89 is now just another metal drummer. Parts that would have made me stop the tape, rewind, and analyze in 89/90 now go by my ears without much thought because so many drummers can play like that now.

There is no doubt, that watching live videos of Metallica in the late 90 and 2000s, Lars isn't the same drummer. Whereas nearly everyone else in metal learned what Lars did then as their starting point.

 

[Mediocrefunkybeat]

I take your point but Reign in Blood was 1986. I think that was the bar-raising point. Master of Puppets the same year. Lombardo’s playing is faster, more intense and I would argue in the long-term more influential.

‘One’ was a semi-mainstream hit a couple of years later, no doubt about it. But to those in ‘the scene’, ‘Angel of Death’ was the one to emulate, I’d imagine.

 

[DrumEatDrum]

I take your point but Reign in Blood was 1986. I think that was the bar-raising point. Master of Puppets the same year. Lombardo’s playing is faster, more intense and I would argue in the long-term more influential.

‘One’ was a semi-mainstream hit a couple of years later, no doubt about it. But to those in ‘the scene’, ‘Angel of Death’ was the one to emulate, I’d imagine.

That was my point though. To hear Slayer or Master of Puppets at the time, you had to know someone who had their album. If you didn't have a friend who had those albums, you didn't hear 'em. There was no internet back then.

But when One came out, that all changed. Suddenly Metallica was on MTV, and that lead to MTV deciding it was ok to play all these other heavy bands too.

Lots of other great double bass work (Scott Travis with Racer-X, Deen Castronovo with Cacaphony & Marty Friendman, Tommy Aldridge on Project Driver, Joe Franco with Vinnie Moore) all had to be mail-ordered out of the back of guitar player magazines if you wanted to hear it. It existed, but few knew about it. I could argue Scott Travis's feet were more talented than either Lars or Dave, but Racer-X was never the band Metallica or Slayer were.

Lombardo in his early days, may be faster, but Lars was more syncopated, and thus, more interesting to my ear. Justice was practically a prog album with all the different time signatures & over-the-bar line stuff. Slayer had more of a punk vibe, which I get appeals to a lot of people, but it didn't interest me so much.

Later on, well, no question Lombardo kept improving and Lars went backward.