Metallica celebrated National American Sign Language Day on Saturday (April 15) by announcing that they will become the first-ever major rock band to release American Sign Language (ASL) videos for every song from their new album. The roll-out began with the official ASL visual for the 72 Seasons title track, which features ASL interpretation from flame-haired Amber Galloway, a fan favorite festival sign language interpreter.
The clip features Galloway taking up one-third of the screen and signing the song’s two-minute guitar intro and galloping drums before tackling singer James Hetfield’s urgent vocals. The project is a collaboration between Metallica and the nonprofit Deaf Professional Arts Network (DPAN) and Galloway’s Amber G Productions.
In a video announcement, self-described hardcore deaf Metallica fan Tom Osbourne explained the project, signing, “It is my honor to announce that on April 25th Metallica will release ALL music videos from 72 Seasons in ASL. Metallica is the first major rock band to do this!”
In a band statement about the title track ASL video — and the upcoming 11 other 72 Seasons ASL clips — the group praised Galloway, who has gone viral several times for her high-energy signing at festivals including Austin City Limits and Lollapalooza. “It’s been an honor to work with Amber and DPAN teams, and we hope that our fans in the deaf and hard of hearing community enjoy experiencing the album through these videos!” the band wrote.
In addition to their ASL video initiative, Metallica released three other videos over the weekend from the album that dropped on Friday. The animated Tristan Zammit-directed clip for “Shadows Fall” has heroic, anime-style versions of the quartet rocking out on a galactic sundial. Another Zammit-helmed animated clip for “Room of Mirrors” takes place in a haunted house filled with toothy flying eyeball monsters. A Tim Saccenti-directed live action performance clip for “Sleepwalk My Life Away” drops the Bay Area RRHOF members in a murky mountain landscape for a moodily lit performance under ominously swirling clouds.
In addition to 8 lyric videos, Metallica was slated to drop a new visual for “TooFar Gone?” at 10 a.m. ET on Monday (April 17).
Check out the ASL “72 Seasons,” ASL announcement and new videos below.
