David Hasselhoff is a Fan of Metallica and Iron Maiden
Actor David Hasselhoff (Knight Rider, Baywatch, etc.) released a metal song earlier this month, “Through the Night,” a collaboration with the Australian metal/industrial/electronic duo Cuestack.
The Hoff has dabbled in metal in the past — his heavy-ish 2015 song “True Survivor,” from the Kung Fury soundtrack, attracted quite a bit of attention even if it wasn’t capital-M Metal — leaving fans and curious onlookers alike wondering: does The Hoff truly love metal?
In a new chat with Consequence of Sound, The Hoff discussed how “Through the Night” came about and went into detail about his fandom of metal, which includes love for bands such as Iron Maiden and Metallica. He explained:
“I had found out through a record label that I have a heavy metal following, and I started to laugh. And I looked out in the audience [at one of my shows] and I saw some heavy metal guys and I went, ‘Wow.’ And I did a song called ‘True Survivor’ for ‘Kung Fury’. I did [a cover of David Bowie’s] ‘Heroes’ with Tyler Bates and it was really cool and it was really hard rock.
“I’m a major fan of Metallica. I’m a fan of Iron Maiden, and I followed Iron Maiden at a concert called Nova Rock [in 2014]. You can look it up. And I said, ‘I’m following Iron Maiden — my stuff is, like, cheesy pop!’ It was about 130,000 people. And I thought 100,000 would leave and we’d have still have 30,000. Nobody left. Everybody came to watch me. It was amazing. And even Iron Maiden hung out to watch my set.
“Everyone’s got a childhood and everyone grows up and they still sing the songs that they remember as a child. My songs may not be the greatest songs in the world, but they were great when you were eight to 18, and they remember the songs.
“And so I did this as a tip of my hat to heavy metal, ’cause I do listen to heavy metal. I do like hard rock. I did an album [last year] called ‘Open Your Eyes’, which was an album of cover songs from the ’80s — from the Jesus and Mary Chain, Echo & The Bunnymen, ‘Lips Like Sugar’. And I went, ‘Wow, these are great songs.’ And [the song] ‘Open Your Eyes’ by The Lords of New Church has really incredible lyrics that are so pertinent for today: ‘Open your eyes to the lies right in front of you.’ And I did that because it was pertinent to today.”
Hasselhoff’s latest album, Open Your Eyes, came out in September 2019. “Through the Night” was released as a standalone single, and you can watch the video for it below.
