A band composition, this song is about the life of Moses. The Creeping Death is the plague inflicted on the Egyptians, also known as the Angel of Death. He was sent by God to kill every firstborn child. Moses told the Jews to save their firstborn sons by putting lamb's blood on their doors. The Egyptians, however, didn't know to do this.
The lyric was inspired by the 1956 movie The Ten Commandments, starring Charlton Heston as Moses. In the movie, the Angel of Death is represented by a green cloud. When bass player Cliff Burton saw it, he thought it looked like "Creeping Death." According to drummer Lars Ulrich, he and frontman James Hetfield watched the movie at Burton's parents' house. "There's a scene where Moses goes back to try and get his people out of Egypt, and when the Pharaoh reneges on that, the firstborn must die," he told Metal Hammer. "Then this fog appears out of the moon and comes down and starts creeping across the ground, smoke machine-style, and everybody who's caught in it falls over and dies on the spot. That's where the words 'Creeping Death' come from."
"Creeping Death" is a concert favorite for Metallica, with the audience joining in for the chorus of "Die! Die! Die!" Speaking on the song's live appeal, Ulrich told the New York Times: "It's got really good energy in the riff, and it sits in a kind of an up-tempo place without being so super fast that it just becomes, like, an indistinguishable roar. But it's got good accents, good dynamics. It's got a breakdown after the second chorus and the guitar solo, where it goes to a shout-along part where James gets everybody pretty engaged."
See your Spotify stats (with number of plays and minutes listened) and discover new music.
Music data, artist images, album covers, and song previews are provided by Spotify. Spotify is a trademark of Spotify AB.