Metallica’s drummer Lars Ulrich has been inspired by many musicians with his own unique drumming style. There are many world-famous drummers who respect him, including legendary names like Mike Portnoy and Joey Jordison. However, the criticism of him should not be underestimated.

In a recent interview by Talk Is Jericho, Lars Ulrich talked about his own drum technique. He mentioned that he felt the need to prove himself and his drum technique. He said:

“I’d never really taken lessons. I just wanted to be in Diamond Head and Motörhead. It was, like, ‘Oh, you have to learn to play the instruments?’ I mean, it was almost like karaoke in the beginning. I just wanted to be in a karaoke heavy metal band. That’s what James and I did — we just sat and played along to Diamond Head.

Then, all of a sudden, it was, like, ‘Wow! This is getting real.’ It wasn’t really intended that way. And so I’d never really taken lessons. So I tool some lessons from one of Satriani’s guys, a super-cool guy. And Kirk took lessons, and we were playing a little bit of catch-up. And so I went through a period that probably culminated in the ‘Justice’ album where I felt sort of compelled to try to show ability.“

He also talked about how he compared himself to Charlie Benante and Dave Lombardo during the “The Big Four” tour. He said:

“Listen, when you’ve got Dave Lombardo and Charlie Benante breathing down your back, it was, like, ‘Okay, I’ve gotta…’ I tried to step it up a little bit and tried to do my own thing and do all this crazy shit, I was trying really hard to push the drums kind of into the foreground. And then, after like a year or two of that, I was, like, ‘Okay. Seriously? Just do your thing. Chill out. Support the riffs. Do what’s best for the song.

I just turned a corner where I just stopped being interested in trying to do thirty-two paradiddles standing upside down backwards fucking Lombardo style. It’s, like, let Lombardo be Lombardo and I’ll kind of just do my own thing. But everybody goes through periods of that kind of thing, and I got mine out of my system pretty early. And, like I said, for the last twenty-five, thirty years or whatever, it’s just been more about making it swing, and that’s what I’m happy to do.“

Lars on the Justice album had a really good performance. We can say that he overcame his limits.