As a woman of a certain vintage, I am not ready to give up rocking out to metal

3 hours ago 4

By Robyn Doreian

October 12, 2025 — 5.00am

Social norms decree a woman of my vintage should be aspiring to an Alaskan cruise, or spending afternoons shaping plasticine Blueys with the grandchildren. Neither of which apply to me, as I am marking the days until Metallica arrives in Australia.

Metallica entered my life subsequent to a brutal break-up with my first long-term boyfriend. My dumping occurred after 18 months spent in London, working as a graphic designer on Q, a music magazine.

Having seen Michael Jackson at Wembley, the Ramones at the Brixton Academy and bumped into Glenda Jackson at my high street launderette, I returned in late 1988 to Melbourne, where I was offered the editorship of Hot Metal, Australia’s debut heavy metal monthly set to launch from Sydney. The opportunity promised both an escape from interludes with my ex, but also the indulgence of my twin loves: rock music and magazines.

Cliff Burton, Kirk Hammett, Lars Ulrich and James Hetfield.

While albums by Guns N’ Roses, Skid Row and Megadeth formed wobbling towers on my Surry Hills office desk, Metallica’s 1987 The $5.98 EP –Garage Days Re-Revisited ruled it. Having spent my late teens immersed in punk rock, Metallica’s five cover versions baptised me to metal’s savage curling riffs and cymbal shatter crash. A ferocity that soon propelled me from nightly post-relationship futon fetal curls to Sydney’s Hordern Pavilion that May, where my blonde hair whipped my sleeveless denim jacket to epic World War I soldier-inspired anthem, One. Not only did I feel spiritually energised, I also discovered the metal community, one that parted to let a five-foot, two-inch woman move to safety, distant from the mosh pit frenzy.

Having granted Metallica some Hot Metal cover stories and posted drummer Lars Ulrich each issue, my first substantial encounter happened in 1991 when I flew to Los Angeles to write about The Black Album, the LP that catapulted their fandom from diehard thrashers to 20 million-plus households, via Enter Sandman, its opening track.

While seated in the back of an old Mercedes, Lars in the front, his tour manager driving us to One On One Recording Studios in North Hollywood, I first felt the warmth and professional respect Metallica afforded me. That James Hetfield (front man), Kirk Hammet (lead guitarist) and Jason Newsted (then bassist) didn’t view me as an oddity in the testosterone-choked ravine of metal, nor a groupie who got lucky, but rather as a fellow music fan who not only loved their band as much as they did, but who also took her magazine responsibilities to her readers seriously.

In subsequent years I intersected with Metallica in differing scenarios: Lars at 3am in a Jacksonville hotel; James scuffing his shoes in a sandbox in Birmingham; Jason the morning after a fan club-only show at South London’s Ministry of Sound; Kirk sitting aloft his Four Seasons Berlin hotel toilet, a black custom guitar shielding his privates for a photo shoot. No security or supervising publicists, just band members and me. Marriage breakdowns, drug abuse, egos and absent fathers were discussed – nothing was off limits. The Men In Black unafraid to share their vulnerability and f--- ups; similarly, their immense joy at playing at venues ranging from San Quentin Prison to Antarctica.

I witnessed them with fans: the superficially macho Hetfield tearing up beside a 16-year-old Hot Metal reader in a wheelchair who was terminally ill with cystic fibrosis.

The privilege and respect shown to me was unfathomable. At times, I questioned: why? None more so than in 1992, when I accompanied the band from Miami to Jacksonville aboard their Learjet. As I sat on the private plane’s custom leather seats, I queried as to how it could be real.

Metal escapades aside, Metallica gifted me incredible self-belief, not just as a woman in the industry, but also as a capable magazine editor and writer. That I had earned my position, deserved to be at the helm – and that as the biggest metal band in the world, they supported it.

Robyn Doreian with Metallica on their Learjet in 1992.

After further stints in London as editor of Kerrang! and Metal Hammer magazines, I returned again to Melbourne in late 2001. The last time I saw Metallica indoors was 15 years ago, when Lars left backstage passes for my sister and me. In an austere offstage room at Rod Laver Arena, Lars appeared in socks and we hugged. I may no longer be a magazine editor who can grant Metallica cover stories (not that they need them), yet our bond remains: that of two metal heads and humans who’ve endured and adored four decades of metal. I like to think we are friends.

Metallica are not just a band to me, they are lifetime companions. Sonic accompaniments to relationship fiascos, international magazine opportunities, British rock festivals, substance abuse and personal tragedies. They are four men who hold a revered place in my life.

Come November 8, as a woman of a certain vintage, I will not be at home watching Antiques Roadshow. Rather, I will stand amid generations of Metallifans at Melbourne’s Marvel Stadium, where alongside 53,000 ’bangers, I’ll thrust devil horns into the night air and sway to Nothing Else Matters.

I hope to reunite with Lars, in particular. He, Metallica’s co-founder and $350 million-plus intergalactic rock star, four inches my senior, and me, an Australian magazine writer. And for us to hug like it’s 1991 – both older and life-worn – yet united by the joy Metallica has bestowed us.

Metallica’s M72 Australian tour begins November 1.

Get the best of Sunday Life magazine delivered to your inbox every Sunday morning. Sign up here for our free newsletter.