A very young Lars Ulrich |
To tell the story of Metallica, one must start with the
story of how the band came into being. And that story starts with Lars Ulrich.
Lars was born in Denmark, to an acclaimed tennis player.
Lars’ father, Torben Ulrich, was also a musician who shared a stage with jazz-legend, Miles
Davis. Lars moved to America in 1980 to pursue a career as tennis player, but
this plan was to fall to the wayside when he met a young James Hetfield.
James Hetfield |
James answered a classified ad which was placed in a
local newspaper, by Ulrich, who was in search of likeminded musicians to jam
along with. It is often sited that the ‘New Wave of British Heavy Metal’ was
the inspiration behind the forming of Metallica, with Ulrich listing Diamond
Head as one of his main influences. With, what would become, the core of
Metallica established, the band was officially formed in October 1981. Having
found a talented singer and guitar player in Hetfield, Ulrich once again placed an
advertisement in a local newspaper, only this time for a lead-guitarist.
Dave Mustain |
After
seeing his expensive guitar equipment, Dave Mustain was immediately recruited.
Ulrich had the opportunity to record a song for Metal Blade Records’ upcoming
compilation disk “Metal Massacre”. The very first original Metallica song to be
recorded was Hit the Lights, which was wrongly credited on the compilation vinyl to
“Mettallica”. Not having a bassist at the time, Hetfield is credited for the
bass duties on the track. Angered by the misspelling of their name, but still
driven, Metallica managed to generate enough interest through the track and
performed live for the first time on March 14, 1982 at Radio City in Anaheim,
California with Ron McGovney on bass duties. This configuration was to be short lived
however.
Cliff Burton |
After attending a show in late 1982 featuring the band Trauma, Ulrich
and Hefield were blown away by the bands bassist, Cliff Burton. Cliff was
immediately approached to play for Metallica, and at first declined the offer,
but later agreed on condition the band move to San Francisco’s Bay area. Since
McGovney “didn’t contribute anything, he just followed” Hetfield, Mustain and
Ulrich left Ron behind in Los Angeles to join up with Burton. With the perfect
fit now established, Metallica was ready to record their debut album. Funded
out of concert promoter, Johny Zazula’s back pocket, the band was off to New
York in May 1983 to record Metal Up Your Ass.
Kirk Hammet |
In April 1983 just before the recording sessions for the
1st album started, Dave Mustain was kicked out of the band due to
his drug and alcohol abuse. Replacement guitarist Kirk Hammet of the band
Exodus was flown in the same day to replace Mustain on the lead guitar. This
sparked a widely-publicised, 20-year feud between Mustain (who would go on to
form rival Thrash metal band Megadeth) and the remaining Metallica members. The
turf-war between Mustain and Metallica had its beginnings with Megadeth
releasing the track "Mechanix" on their 1985 debut offering Killing Is My
Business and Business Is Good... Mustain claimed that new guitarist, Hammet,
“stole my job” and that he became famous “by playing my riffs” – a claim he
substantiated by saying that Metallica’s track off their debut album, The Four
Horsemen is a reworked version of Megadeth’s Mechanix.
1884 Seven Gates of Hell Tour flyer |
The band kept to a hectic schedule, and went straight
back to the studio to record Ride The Lightning. Recorded in early 1984 at
Sweet Silence Studios in Denmark, the album again took less than a month to
complete. Singles from the album include For Whom The Bell Tolls, Fade to Black
and Creeping Death. These 3 songs tell the biblical story of the Hebrew’s exodus from Egypt focusing on the plague that descended on the Egyptians. This is
evident of Hetfield’s strict Christian upbringing. With themes touching on
sensitive issues like religion, corrupt leaders, insanity and drugs, it’s quite
clear that the band had a need to be heard, and that Hetfield was not just
another angry-at-the-world teenager, but had an opinion - and a strong one at
that.
It was during the European stage of the Damage Inc. Tour, in support of Master of Puppets that Metallica would lose bassist Cliff Burton in a bus accident in rural Sweden.
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