Sad But True

This song is about a nefarious dual personality that tries to control you - the devil on the shoulder. We'd all like to think this dark side pushing the impulse to lie and steal is some other being, but bad news: It's you... sad but true. Metallica frontman James Hetfield got the idea for the lyric from the 1978 Anthony Hopkins film Magic, about a ventriloquist controlled by his evil puppet.

"Sad But True" was the last of five singles released from Metallica's self-titled album, also known as The Black Album. It was one of the first songs the band started working on for the album; James Hetfield and drummer Lars Ulrich came up with the track in the summer of 1990 and put it on a demo with three others: "Enter Sandman," "Wherever I May Roam" and "Nothing Else Matters." This was a very creative and productive time for the band. The album was released in August 1991 and became their pièce de résistance, a metal landmark. "Sad But True" was issued as a single in February 1993, a year and a half after the album came out and two and a half years after the song was conceived. It wasn't a huge chart hit but became one of their most popular live songs and a fan favorite.

Like "Thing That Should Not Be," this was written and performed in standard-D tuning for guitar, but the song's demo was originally in the key of E. Producer Bob Rock recalled to Musicradar.com: "We were in pre-production, which was uncomfortable because nobody had ever made them go through their songs in such a deliberate way before, and six songs in 'Sad But True' came along. Suddenly, I realized that every song, including this one, was in the key of E. I brought this to the band's attention, and they said, 'Well, isn't E the lowest note?' So I told them that on Motley Crue's Dr. Feelgood, which I produced and Metallica loved, the band had tuned down to D. Metallica then tuned down to D, and that's when the riff really became huge. It was this force that you just couldn't stop, no matter what."