[youtube]http://youtu.be/qni_QAucqnI[/youtube]

Last month, we all got to hear the first new Metallica song in six years when the band debuted “The Lords of Summer.” Then we got to hear an even cleaner version of it when they released the “Garage Demo” version of the song on Youtube. But according to a new interview with Lars Ulrich, that might be the only new music we get to hear from the band in some time. In an interview with Argentinian news outlet TN, the drummer says that they’ve started working on the next record, but is only hopeful that the band finish writing this year, and doesn’t put any timetable on when it’ll be ready other than “hopefully next year.”

“We’ve started writing songs and preparing for the next record, so that’s very exciting,” he tells TN. “We’re down here among all of you beautiful people and playing ‘By Request’ and going to new places. We were in Quito two days ago, where we’d never been.

“We’re playing a new song on stage, which people seem to be very receptive to. We’re writing away. Hopefully, we will be done writing this year and next year we should record and hopefully have a new record out maybe next year. We’ll see. Hopefully next year.”

To be clear, they’re Metallica. There’s no rush from the band to finish the album, given that they own all their masters (MASTERS!), and are continuing to rake in revenue. The Black Album alone sells about 2,000 copies/week. Not to mention they’re on tour. But it certainly seemed like they might actually turn in an album this year (we hoped so back at the beginning of the year, anyway). Now we can hope for next year, but with this quote, it might not even be until 2016 that we hear anything. So give another listen to “The Lords of Summer,” since it might be two Summers until you hear the next new song from them.

[youtube]http://youtu.be/AiOtev3rEKI[/youtube]