“Do you always do that?” Metallica’s hulking frontman, James Hetfield, asks Lars Ulrich, a hint of agitation in his voice. The two are facing each other in the “Tuning Room,” where the band typically rehearses before a show. It’s roughly 20 minutes to showtime on the first night of the tour, at Baltimore’s M&T Bank Stadium, and they’re trying to get their 1991 classic “Wherever I May Roam” right, but the drummer is playing a strange off-kilter rhythm.

Fifteen years ago, this might have resulted in a long, teary group-therapy session, as documented in the 2004 film Some Kind of Monster. “What I said was a nice way of saying ‘What the hell are you doing?'” the frontman says later with a laugh. But today, Hetfield drops the issue and lets Ulrich play the song his own way while exchanging grins with guitarist Kirk Hammett and bassist Rob Trujillo.

Click here for a complete behind-the-scenes look at Metallica’s summer tour.

Photo Credit:  Dana Distortion