William Shatner Covers Metallica, Ozzy at Metal Debut — SkimNews
Get the Culture newsletter
Daily culture — film, music, books, the trends and ideas worth your attention. Free.
- William Shatner, 95, made his heavy metal debut Saturday at Chicago's Park West during a Riot Fest after-hours warmup gig, one day before the band's first official Riot Fest show on Sunday.
- Shatner and the uckers played a six-song set that included three tracks from their upcoming album What the F Is Heavy Metal?* alongside covers of Ozzy Osbourne's "Crazy Train," Metallica's "Enter Sandman," and Motörhead's "Ace of Spades."
- The upcoming album features guest appearances from Black Sabbath's Tony Iommi, Queen's Brian May, Judas Priest's Rob Halford, and Slayer's Dave Lombardo, among other metal veterans.
- Shatner framed the pivot as a new frontier, telling fans on social media: "I have explored space. I have explored time. Now … I explore distortion," following prior genre forays into spoken word, blues, country, Christmas, and children's music.
- Shatner told Billboard heavy metal is "the rhythm of life" and "an energy that permeates your body and lifts you up," adding he was having custom earbuds made for the group ahead of the performance.
Why it matters: At 95, Shatner is adding a sixth genre to a musical résumé most rockers never attempt — and he's doing it with bona fide metal royalty (Iommi, May, Halford, Lombardo) on the record, which signals this is a produced crossover project rather than a one-off publicity stunt tied to Riot Fest.
Ask SkimNews
