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The Band History.
If you find anything
missing, please e-mail me.
| LinkExchange Member | Free Homepages at Geocities |
If you find anything
missing, please e-mail me.
1980
A young Lars Ulrich was addicted to the NWOBHM (New Wave Of British
Heavy Metal), and he tried to put his own band together. At this
point, his attempt failed, but he placed an ad in a magazine called
Recycler, to which one James Hetfield answered. James and Lars met up
to jam, but nothing became of this first meeting.
Summer 81
Lars went to the UK to follow Diamond Head around for 3 months on
tour. On his return he secured a deal to record a track for the Metal
Blade compilation Metal Massacre. Due to the fact that he didn't yet
have a band, he quickly began contacting people. The three members he
managed to put together were:
+ Lars Ulrich (Drums)
+ James Hetfield (Vocals; Rhythm and Bass Guitars)
+ Lloyd grant (Lead guitar)
14.03.82.
Metallica's first show ever! At Radio City, in Anaheim, CA.
XX.04.82.
In order to get a certain live gig, Metallica needed to present some
of their material, so they recorded a demo, later known as Power
Metal. This was recorded with James, Lars, Ron McGovney, and Dave
Mustaine. There isn't an actual title for this demo, but when it
surfaced as a bootleg, the name stuck. The name comes from some early
business cards of the band that Ron printed up.
xx.04.82
They re-recorded four tracks: Hit The Lights, Mechanix, Jump In The
Fire, and Motorbreath. This new version of Hit The Lights appeared on
the second pressing of Metal Massacre 1 (also the recent re-release).
25.05.82
Metallica played a gig at Lars’ high school, Backbay High School,
managing to almost empty the hall.
28.05.82
They played as a five piece band for the first time with Jef Warner on
vocals (luckily he didn't last).
14.06.82
The first print of the Metal Massacre compilation album was released,
and included Metallica's first take of Hit The Lights. The second
print had another version of this track. The album was released by
Brian Slagel; this was the first release on his new label, Metal
Blade.
06.07.82.
The demo No Life 'Til Leather was recorded. This demo was never
officially released, but copies were made and spread like wildfire.
Tracks included were:
+ Hit The Lights
+ Mechanix
+ Motorbreath
+ Seek And Destroy
+ Metal Militia
+ Jump In The Fire
+ Phantom Lord
Line-up was as follows:
+ Lars Ulrich (Drums)
+ James Hetfield (Vocals and Rhythm Guitar)
+ Ron McGovney (Bass Guitar)
+ Lloyd Grant (Lead Guitar, just for the solos)
xx.08.82
Brian Slagel told the band about a great bass player (Cliff Burton) in
a band called Trauma that played the Whiskey a Go-Go. James and Lars
were not happy with Ron McGovney, and where so amazed by Cliff's
playing, that they realized that this was the new bass player for
Metallica. Cliff was not interested, but said that he would join the
band if they moved to San Francisco, for he thought L.A. was a
fucked-up freak show.
18.09.82
To promote the Metal Massacre album, Brian Slagel organized a gig with
the bands the San Francisco. This was the first time Metallica played
in front of the Bay Area crowd, and it was a crucial job for them. All
of the kids joined the headbangers on stage and went nuts. Metallica
had to follow up this show with numerous gigs in the Bay Area.
29.11.82.
The guys played at "The Old Waldorf" in San Francisco, with support
from a band named Exodus, with one Kirk Hammett on guitar; this was
the first time they met him. The show was recorded, and today is known
as the Live Metal Up Your Ass demo. They intended to record it through
the mixing board, but something went wrong, so instead they set up a
boombox in front of the speaker stacks; technically, this recording is
an audience recording. Both Metal Up Your Ass and No Life 'Til Leather
came with a cassette liner that was written by Lars and contained the
track listings and the band logo. This was Dave Mustaine's first show
with the band.
30.11.82
Mabuhay Gardens. The last gig with Ron on bass. They soon afterwards
asked Cliff Burton to join; upon hearing this, Ron left.
28.12.82
First jam session with Cliff Burton.
xx.01.83
The band is invited by record shop owner Jon Zazula to do some gigs on
the East Coast. He also tries to get them a record contract, but when
this fails, he founds his own record label, Megaforce Records, and
signs Metallica as his first band.
March 83
March of '83 saw them on a journey from SF to New York to play a
number of dates organized by Jonny Z of Megaforce Records. During this
trip Dave’s drinking problems were getting a bit out of hand. The
morning after they played a show in Vandenburg, supporting VENOM, they
asked Dave to leave. Meanwhile, Kirk was already on his way over by
plane to replace him.
05.03.83
Cliff Burton's first gig with the band, in San Francisco, at The
Stone.
16.03.83
The "Megaforce demo" was recorded. This is Cliff Burton's first
recording with the band. There are two different stories about this
recording, and I'm not sure which version is correct, if either...
Story one: the band used this recording (containing Whiplash and No
Remorse) to get a contract with Megaforce Records. Story two: the band
wanted to capture a recording with Cliff, so they did, and then took
the tape to KUSF FM in San Francisco, where it was played over the
air.
19.03.83
Live at The Stone in San Francisco. This was the second gig with
Cliff, and this show was videotaped. Parts of this show are on the
"Cliff 'Em All" video issued by Metallica.
April 83
Lars, James and Dave all re-located to San Francisco, where Cliff
lived; he now became a full member of Metallica.
01.04.83
Metallica called Kirk Hammett and asked him if he would like to join
Metallica in New York for an audition. Kirk thought someone played an
April Fool's trick on him, and answered "Yes, sure". The next day they
called again to supply further details, and he realized that they were
serious.
09.04.83
Live at L'Amours in Brooklyn, New York. The last gig with Dave
Mustaine.
16.04.83
Having done his audition for Metallica, Kirk was accepted into the
band; on this day he did his first gig with them in New Jersey.
Exodus, Kirk’s previous band, went on to release some good thrash
albums in the 80's and early 90's.
May 1983
They went into the studio to record their first album, Kill 'Em All,
produced by Paul Curcio. Originally, this album was to be called
"Metal Up Your Ass", but the record distributors refused to release an
album with such a name. The name was immediately changed to Kill 'Em
All, in reference to the record industry's distributors.
xx.07.83.
Kill 'Em All was released.
27.06.83
Metallica went on the road for a two month tour with Raven for the
"Kill 'Em All For One" tour (the Raven album at the time was entitled
All for One). The tour ended on September 3, 1983.
October-December 83.
Metallica spent their time writing new material for the next album,
Ride The Lightning.
February 84
The quartet visited Europe for the first time. They went on a tour
supporting VENOM, starting in Zurich, Switzerland and covering
Germany, France and Belgium, then finishing with the Aardshock
Festival in Zwolle, Holland. During this tour, the British label,
Music for Nations, released the 'Jump in the Fire' EP to promote the
tour.
27.06.84
Ride The Lightning is released by Megaforce records.
xx.11.84
The "Creeping Death" EP is released, featuring the original garage
days on the B-side. Included is one cover tune, originally recorded by
Blitzkrieg, and one track by Diamond Head. These tracks are now
available on the re-release of Kill 'Em All, and Garage Days
Re-Revisited is the follow up to this recording.
17.08.85
Performed for the first time at the famous Monsters of Rock festival
at Donnington, England. Metallica was squeezed in-between two poser
bands, Ratt and Bon Jovi, on the bill. James decided to tell the
70,000 kids what to expect: "If you came here to see spandex, eye
makeup, and the words 'Oh baby' in every fuckin' song, this ain't the
fuckin' band."
xx.09.85 - 27.12.85.
The band was in Copenhagen again, recording the third album, this time
with producer Flemming Rasmussen.
xx.03.86
Master Of Puppets was released.
27.03.86
The tour with Ozzy Osbourne starts. This was a very important tour for
Metallica, supporting Ozzy, as their popularity was steadily rising
and they were ready to hit the bigtime. This was also their last tour
as a supporting act.
26.06.86.
Shortly before a gig in Adamsville, James broke his wrist in the
infamous "skateboarding incident." The show was cancelled, and during
the rest of the tour James sang with his arm in a sling while John
Marshall stood in on guitar. At that time, John Marshall was Kirk’s
guitar roadie, as well as a member of the band Metal Church.
27.09.86
It was approaching dawn on Saturday, the 27th of September, 1986.
Metallica's two tour buses were making their way along a god-forsaken
road that lies somewhere between the Scandinavian cities of Stockholm
and Copenhagen. Apart from these vehicles, the route was deserted -
there was no one else travelling at that unearthly hour of the
morning. Suddenly, for no apparent reason, just before 6:15 a.m., one
of the coaches swerved violently to its right and started careening
wildly down the wrong side of the road. It was out of control, and a
crash was inevitable.
The bus' brief, but horrific, excursion came to a halt some 60 feet
further up the tarmac. By this time, the vehicle was on its side and
lying in a ditch by the side of the road, near the small Swedish town
of Ljungby.
During the unavoidable confusion that followed, the vast majority of
the overturned bus' passengers managed to scramble free of the
wreckage. Those that emerged included three of the four members of the
band. In all honesty, the survivors had been extremely lucky, as they
had all somehow managed to escape with little more than minor injuries
and shock.
Swedish police arriving on the scene of the crash immediately arrested
the driver as a matter of routine, but later released him without
charges after further investigation revealed that the cause of the
crash was black ice on a nasty bend in the road.
Unfortunately, however, there had been one fatality in the
accident...... what is more, the deceased individual turned out to be
one of the group. So, tragically, in the short space of those few
dreadful seconds on that lonely Swedish road, Metallica's dreamlike
existence was suddenly transformed into a hellish nightmare. Their 24
year old bass player, Cliff Burton, was dead.
"I saw the bus lying right on him. I saw his legs sticking out. I
freaked. The bus driver, I recall, was trying to yank the blanket out
from under him to use for other people. I just went, 'Don't fucking do
that!' I already wanted to kill the guy. I don't know if he was drunk
or if he hit some ice. All I knew was, he was driving and Cliff wasn't
alive anymore." James Hetfield -1993