Here’s another accomplishment Metallica can add to their impressive resume: being named after a newly discovered deep-sea crustacean.
According to Phys.org, the “worm-like” creature is called Macrostylis metallicola, and inhabits an area of the northern Pacific Ocean known as the Clarion Clipperton Zone, which is between Mexico and Hawaii.
“The powerful music of Metallica has accompanied me the majority of my life,” says Dr. Torben Riehl, who, along with Dr. Bart De Smet, discovered the crustacean. “Songs such as ‘Master of Puppets’ and “One’ are outstanding masterpieces in rock history and I am thrilled to be able to give something back to the band by naming a new species after them!”
Metallica themselves acknowledged the news in a Facebook post, writing, “We’ve played on all seven continents, made it into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and now…we’re a crustacean!”
The metal legends add that they see a lot of commonalities between them and they’re namesake species.
“The worm-like creature dwells in complete darkness, has no eyes, and is colorless. Talk about Blackened!” the band writes. “It also lives amongst metallic nodules containing cobalt, copper, manganese, nickel, and rare-earth elements. So it basically lives in a rock stadium? Now that’s one metal crustacean!”
Metallica will return to rock stadiums in April when they launch a tour of South America. They’ll be back in the U.S. in May to play the Epicenter and Welcome to Rockville festivals.
Earlier this week, Metallica announced that they’d be canceling their headlining sets at the Sonic Temple and Louder than Life festivals, as those dates will conflict with James Hetfield‘s “critical recovery events” as part of his ongoing rehabilitation from substance abuse issues.
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