But now the wait could be over as he tells Rolling Stone: "The record is well on its way. It may come out any century now, actually. There's a saying: where there's life, there's hope.

"I'd say it's mostly done. There are all these other responsibilities that have to be taken care of. Life in Metallica these days is not only about making a record; it's about these things and we played a show at AT&T Park and he does this, I do this.

"We have all these sort of different things that we turn to. But the record gets worked on where there's absolutely nothing else going on." He adds: "In all seriousness, it's actually what we like. It works for us. It's not just record, tour, record, tour. We like to do.