Interview on the official website
According to an interview posted on Metallica , the band's new album has already begun mixing. The news came from an interview with Lars and Kirk, conducted by band crew member Dan Nykolayko.
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In the interview, Nykolayko says, “I managed to corner Lars and James at headquarters before they locked themselves in the control room to start mixing the new album with Greg Fidelman.” The interview was posted on June 9th.
In an interview with Metal Forces at the end of May, drummer Lars Ulrich stated that the new work would be finished in June: “If the album doesn’t come out by the end of the year, it won’t be because it’s not ready. It will be for a cosmic reason that it would be smarter to wait until next year. But the album will be ready this summer.”