Metallica

Now the story finally comes to the name “METALLICA”. After recording “Hit The Lights”, Lars and James needed a name under which to present themselves to the world. Back in those days, long and inflated names like today, were not in fashion, so it was quite a task picking a good name. James and Lars have gone over a whole bunch of different names like Grinder, Blitzer, Red Vette, Helldriver, and even Thunderf**k. They both really liked the name Thunderf**k and even came up with a logo for it, but censorship is censorship and they didn’t want to take their chances with this name, so they had to keep on thinking. They finally got help with this from another Lars’s friend Ron Quintann. Ron often visited Lars, and one fall evening of 1981, he came to Ulrich glowing from happiness and told Lars, that his lifelong dream - creating his own heavy-metal newspaper – is about to turn to reality, and that all he needed was a name for his paper! It turned out that Ron already had two choices, and he couldn’t decide to pick either “Metallica” or “Metal Mania”. Trying to hide his excitement, Lars blurted out that “Metal Mania” was way better. This famous theft happened on October 27, 1981, giving the world METALLICA. Almost the next day, James created a logo for the name: the one with arrows, which you can see on any Metallica merchandise today. Passing the name and the logo to Brian Slegel, Lars and James started on the actual problems: getting a bassist and a second guitarist. Bassist was found very fast – this empty place was given to good old Ron McGownie. Even though neither Lars not James ever took Ron as a real musician, they had to compile the band the sooner the better – that was the main condition for participating in the project of Brian Slegel. Finding the second guitarist took a while longer. The fact that Lloyd Grant is not going to stay in Metallica longer than it took to record “Hit The Lights” was apparent to everyone: Lars and James didn’t consider him fit for the rhythm guitar. After trying out a couple dozens different guitarists, they had to turn to their old tested method – the newspaper ad. It worked this time too, getting Metallica – Dave Mustane. For Dave playing the guitar was the only escape in his awful childhood, so he was good enough for Metallica, and after one rehearsal Dave did with them, he became their member. First thing, Dave called their “Hit The Lights” and the band rerecorded all the solos in it. In fact the new version did turn out much better.At this time, the kind of music METALLICA played, not only nobody else in America played, but nobody even heard it! It was really something new, and unheard of before. This can be explained be the absence of Metallica concerts, which in turn can be explained by Metallica not being fully compiled (James Hetfield, was still torn between vocals and guitar, and refused to do both).

Finally, the historic even – first, the very first concert of Metallica – happened in the club called “Radio City” in Anaheim, on March 14, 1982. For Metallica it was a completely new feeling new atmosphere – the world of live music, unity of performers and listeners, where the boundaries between the two disappear. However, in those years only a few people took interest in Metallica’s music, and the masses were crazy about the Glam-rock. Despite all that, guys’ popularity somehow kept growing and even Europe heard of Metallica!

After some touring, Metallica set (which consisted of only “Hit The Lights” at the time) finally had three more songs added to it: “The Mechanix”, “Jump In The Fire”, and Hetfield’s “Motorbreath”. In April of 82 these three plus “Hit The Lights” were recorded on tape in McGownie’s garage. Later this tape became a basis for all the business deals. Lars Ulrich and a guy named Patrick Scott, started on distribution of these tapes, by passing out free copies with card that said Metallica and their phone number to almost anyone they saw.

At the same time, the band was continuously searching for a rhythm guitarist. They found an extremely weird guy named Brad Parker, but after one concert with him, they had to kick Brad out, and James Hetfield finally realized that he would have to carry the burden, of playing the rhythm guitar.

In 1982 the “Metal Massacre” finally came out. Even though its cover had countless typos and the band’s name was spelled “Mettallica”, it became their first official disc, and planted the seeds where Metallica’s later fame would be partly rooted.

Things really to started to pick up the pace for Metallica when of their concert recordings wound up in the hands of Kenny Kane, owner and manager of independent company “High Velocity”. Having found Metallica’s work very innovative, Kane contacted the band and offered Metallica to release a whole EP, promising to cover all the recording costs. Sure enough, the band agreed, but later it turned out that the concert tape Kane heard had only the cover songs, not the Metallica originals, so Kane refused to put out the Metallica vinyl. However, the band still got their paid studio where they recorded “No Life ‘Till Leather” – their new demo tape, which was spread the same way as the first one.

On September 18 in San Francisco, Metallica appeared at the presentation of “Metal Massacre” organized by Brian Slegel himself. The band wound up there pure accidentally after Cirith Ungol (one of Slegel’s picks) couldn’t make it. The interesting thing was that all the fans that came to that concert had “No Life ‘Till Leather” and jointly sang the words of almost all the Metallica songs. This was the first time Metallica met with its real fans.

Metallica continued playing in San Francisco, gaining more and popularity until November 28, when the band finally headlined their own show! That show was also where and when Metallica met Kirk Hammett, who then played in Exodus – a band who was warming the crowd up at the show.

At the same time, there were and more problems with Ron McGownie in the middle of Metallica itself. Ron was getting more and more distant from other band members, even during their friendly parties. As things were getting worse, Brian Slegel invited Lars and James to visit concert of the band called Trauma. There, both were completely captivated by Trauma’s bassist – Cliff Burton. Cliff didn’t have any desire to leave Trauma, but after the concert and months after that Lars and James were literally stalking Burton, trying to get him into Metallica. Ron McGownie accidentally found out about all this, and in December he officially left Metallica. Several weeks after that whole Metallica moved to San Francisco, and Cliff Burton finally agreed to play with them.

When 1983 started, growing financial problems stopped Metallica’s growth, until they a very influential west coast guy named Johnny Z. Johnny Z. managed his own store called “Rock-n-roll Heaven” where you could find anything connected with heavy metal. Same Johnny Z. also organized rock concerts in New York and New Jersey from time to time. Johnny convinced Metallica to go New York where he housed all four guys for three months!Gradually Dave Mustane and his heavy drinking started to distance him from the band as Ron got distanced before that. Moreover, other members of Metallica got an Exodus tape and just as they did with Cliff, they got determined that they have got to have Kirk Hammett instead of Dave. In April of 83 they shamelessly booted Dave, and instantly Kirk Hammett became the newest member of the band. Still Metallica kept playing at the same clubs introducing their new member to the public. The fun ended when Johnny Z. kicked them all out of his house for drinking two bottles of champagne that were his family’s treasure. For several weeks Metallica had to live in the abandoned warehouse.

In the beginning of May, however, the band got news from Johnny that even though he kicked them out of this house, he kept his word, and rented a recording studio “Music America” for two weeks. May 10, 1983 Metallica first came into that studio. Their material was ready and dozens if not even hundreds of times rehearsed. Finally, Metallica got its wish and they could release their own disc!!!