“My Friend of Misery” features a main riff written by bassist Jason Newsted and was originally planned as an instrumental.
Newsted brought the central musical idea to the sessions, and the band developed it into one of The Black Album’s darker, more atmospheric tracks. James Hetfield and Lars Ulrich joined Newsted in the songwriting credit, while the finished recording included lyrics rather than remaining instrumental.
The song is notable because Metallica’s earlier albums had included an instrumental track, but The Black Album did not. “My Friend of Misery” began as the candidate for that role, making its eventual vocal arrangement an important detail in the album’s development.
The track appears late in the album sequence, before “The Struggle Within.” Its brooding bass-led foundation and restrained opening distinguish it from the record’s more direct singles. The title is sometimes confused with other introspective songs on the album, especially “The God That Failed,” but the Newsted riff story specifically belongs to “My Friend of Misery.”