Metallica Honor Jason Newsted With Unboxing Of ‘Black Album’ Boxset

With the imminent release of Metallica’s Black Album reissue, the band has honored their longtime and former band member Jason Newsted, with a new unboxing video of their massive Black Album deluxe boxset. In the video, Newsted runs down the immense features of the package and highlights some stories behind the album and the album’s tour cycle.

“Just so you know, I haven’t seen any of the preliminary, anything on this [boxset] — I’m seeing it for the first time. All of it. I haven’t even listened to the record for years,” Jason says in the unboxing video. Reflecting on some of the vintage promotional items included in the set, from photoshoots to magazine covers, Newsted states “I remember all of these like they were yesterday actually.”

While to some this unboxing video might only be a neat promotion and inside rundown of the packaging, it’s far more than that to a great number of Metallica fans. Jason Newsted was an integral part of Metallica throughout the late 80’s and up until his departure in the early 2000’s. More over he was an essential component to the making of the Black Album; Jason is credited as a songwriter for one of the album’s 12 tracks, “My Friend Of Misery.”

Ever since Metallica announced the Black Album reissue there wasn’t any mention of whether or not Jason was being included in the 30th anniversary of the record. Having Jason showcase the boxset not only pays tribute to him but also to the band’s fans who grew up with his era of Metallica. And while it is a rather minimal tribute, it’s understandable seeing that Jason hasn’t been a part of the band for the last two decades.

Overall, this was a great nod of respect from Metallica, and as a fan one can only hope there’s more opportunity for Jason to step in and maybe be involved in the band’s upcoming 4oth anniversary shows this year. However, it’s easy to fantasize from a fan perspective, but it also should be mentioned that the band did make a point to include him as well as other previous members (Dave Mustaine, Ron McGovney) at their 3oth anniversary show in 2011. Either way, Jason did recently mention that he’s no longer capable of performing Metallica’s music due to his physicality.