Speak N' Destroy

Nico Perrino is the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression Executive Vice President and host of FIRE’s So to Speak: The Free Speech Podcast. Before his writing appeared in the Los Angeles Times, Politico, and The Guardian, Nico's first byline was in So What!, the Metallica fan club magazine. He discovered Metallica at age 10, spent his teenage years playing guitar in a Chicago metal band, and now devotes his life to fighting for the same issues addressed in Metallica songs like "Eye of the Beholder." Nico co-directed “Mighty Ira: A Civil Liberties Story” (2020), a feature-length film about the life and career of former ACLU Executive Director Ira Glasser, and worked as Creative Consultant on “Can We Take a Joke?” (2015), a film about censorship in stand-up comedy. He talks with Ryan J. Downey about the Metallica catalog, Iced Earth, In Flames, Trivium, Christopher Hitchens, his work with the FIRE Org, and why "Free speech makes people free." Speak N' Destroy theme by Sc