As Antonio Gramsci argued, ruling groups maintain power partly by making their ideas seem like common sense. This helps explain the political significance of Metallica’s call for disengagement at a time when Israel’s genocide in Palestine demands urgent international attention. Hetfield’s vague agenda of “love, energy and heavy music” ultimately amounts to a refusal to stand for anything meaningful. And that refusal is itself deeply political.
I think it’s a bad idea to let later knowledge ruin music… usually (yes there are some exceptions…don’t read about the band Lostprophets…). Metallica is a band of idiots with bad selfish opinions. That doesn’t mean they didn’t make good art decades ago.