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December 16th was declared Metallica Day in San Francisco, California in light of the band’s 40th anniversary.

The band was honored by Mayor London Breed and California Governor Gavin Newsom for both their career and their charitable work.

The PrP reports that Lars Ulrich and Robert Trujillo accepted the award with Ulrich commenting, “There was a sense of music community for people like ourselves who felt like outsiders, who liked things that were not in the mainstream, and that was has obviously been a significant part of San Francisco’s history. So coming up here in 1982, standing on the shoulder of the history of the culture, the Beat poets and the hippie movement and the music and Bill Graham and everything that San Francisco represented, we were just embraced instantly.

“We felt so welcomed, so loved and we felt finally like we belonged someplace. And it’s been 39 years of feeling that sense of belonging, to not just a geographical place — San Francisco, the Bay Area, Northern California, whatever you wanna call it — but it’s also a state of mind. You belong to what San Francisco represents.”

The band will be performing a pair of 40th anniversary shows at the Chase Center in San Francisco, CA Friday, December 17th and Sunday, December 19th. Both shows will be livestreamed.