Metallica, Slayer, Megadeth and Anthrax made thrash-metal history last year when they performed on the same bill in a string of European shows, and now they will bring their blistering sonic collective to the U.S. on April 23 in a most unexpected venue -- the Empire Polo Field in Indio.

The seven "Big Four" shows were major music moments, with a Bulgaria date yielding a bestselling boxed set (bundling CDs with DVDs or Blu-rays) and an HD satellite broadcast that reached fans in hundreds of movie theaters. Tickets for the one-night show go on sale at 10 a.m. Friday through Ticketmaster.

The metal extravaganza will be staged the Saturday after the Coachella Valley Music & Arts Festival, and the organizers of that California festival are behind this surprise booking. 

The show came together quickly. Promoter Paul Tollett, the founding figure behind Coachella and its country cousin, the Stagecoach Festival, found himself with an empty weekend between the two massive multi-artist shows and, after a casual conversation with Metallica manager Peter Mensch, the two came up with a bold way to fill the calendar gap.

-- Geoff Boucher

Photo: James Hetfield of Metallica. Credit: Jason Merritt / Getty Images for Activision

Continuing their efforts to reward music fans who still patronize independent record stores, a coalition of small retailers will be offering exclusive releases on Nov. 26 from rock, pop, R&B and country artists including U2, Metallica, Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, George Harrison, Jimi Hendrix and many others.

The special releases are part of indie retailers' "Back to Black Friday" promotion for the day after Thanksgiving, typically the heaviest shopping day of the year.

Many are being released on vinyl, which gives rise to the "back to black" theme. Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers, Cee-Lo, Iron & Wine and Drive-By Truckers are among the other acts participating.

"These exclusive pieces not only create nice sales, but a lasting memory and connection between the customer, the store, the employee and the artist, whose importance can't be overstated," Mike Batt, who owns Silver Platters, a Seattle indie music store, said in a statement Thursday.

The store owners also seek to increase awareness of existing retailers each spring with National Record Store Day, which also has become something of a cause celebre among pop and rock stars.

"Many of the great indies have disappeared in recent years, but Record Store Day is giving us yet another chance to show appreciation to this wonderful endangered slice of Americana," Patterson Hood of Drive-By Truckers said in the same statement.

Among exclusive high-profile reissues coming to the indie stores for the holiday season are a special edition of Harrison's 1970 solo triple-album "All Things Must Pass" and a Hendrix holiday EP, "Merry Christmas & A Happy New Year."

-- Randy Lewis

Reporting from Austin, Texas — Metallica was in Austin last week for a not-so-secret show at the South by Southwest music festival designed to promote a new edition of the video game Guitar Hero, due out this month. But the band's outspoken drummer, Lars Ulrich, took the opportunity to set the record straight on key issues facing the group, including its relationship with its longtime label Warner Music Group and the proposed Ticketmaster-Live Nation merger.

Metallica's 2008 release "Death Magnetic" was the last the group contractually owed to Warner, and Ulrich said he's ready to consult with another famously anti-corporate artist, Nine Inch Nails' Trent Reznor, about surviving outside the major-label system.

When asked if the band needed a major label, Ulrich, despite being surrounded by Warner reps, didn't mince words. "Without offending any of the good people from the record company in the room, no," Ulrich said. "Let's cut to the chase. . . . The primary -- not the only, but the primary -- function of a record label is to act as a bank. When you're fortunate enough to be successful and so on, you don't need to rely on record companies as the banks. . . .

"We're doing a bunch of shows with Trent this summer in Europe. I look forward to sitting down and talking to him about what's on his radar."

James Hetfield might be the frontman for one of rock’s most formidable entities, but when it comes to stage patter he's a bit of a corn dog. "I have an announcement to make," said the faux-hawked singer and rhythm guitarist Wednesday, commencing the first of his band's two night's at the Forum. "Metallica is alive and well and ready to kick some. . . . " Finishing his thought with a mild expletive, Hetfield sounded more like a bridegroom who'd grabbed the microphone at a wedding reception than like a knight of the Heavy Metal round table. But it didn't matter. At a Metallica concert, actions speak louder than words.

The California band, which razed and reconstructed the edifice of heavy metal in the 1980s only to grow sluggish and surly in the decade following, has returned this year with a strong new album, “Death Magnetic,” and a stated desire to recommit -- to its audience, its trademark "heavy" sound and itself.

This tour, and particularly the shows at L.A.'s iconic arena for hard rock, furthered the band's renewal in several ways. In two hours that relied on no filler beyond Hetfield's amiable admonitions, the four members of Metallica played at top volume with focused ease and strength, right on top of the crowd but in unbreakable communion with one another. The performance made a musical case for the band's new songs by juxtaposing them with favorites from throughout the group's nearly 30-year career, unleashing the powerful exchange of energies that defines Metallica's purpose and its appeal.