The Chivalry Chronicles
We discuss topics such as Brotherhood, Masculinity, and Fatherhood. A modern manly approach to chivalry.
Or better yet, Guys Stuff that Guys Do, Cuz We're Guys.
The Chivalry Chronicles
Episode 020 (Chivalry After Hours) - The Rise of Metallica (Part 1)
Leo and Jaime discuss the rise of Metallica.
Metallica is a heavy metal band formed in 1981 in Los Angeles.
- Became widely known as a Bay Area band after they moved from Los Angeles.
- Discussed the origins on the their name.
- Discussed the original band members and several iterations.
- Discussed their Discography.
- The Big Four
- What made the band iconic?
- Discuss the loss of a band member.
- Discuss what they think was the downfall of metallica.
Issue a verdict.
if by some chance some stroke of luck or some act of god you have stumbled upon this broadcast you are listening to the chivalry chronicles with your host dr dlh
SPEAKER_00:i'm a damn doctor
SPEAKER_02:David. We're going to bring the tea. I refuse to not drink during the podcast. Yeah. And me, Jaime. They need to make podcast equipment a lot more expensive to get some of these clowns off the air. Gather around as we discuss a modern manly approach to chivalry. So I hope you're ready because I know we are. So let's get into it. And we're back, sitting here, having a couple of beers, talking to Leo Noriega, which is, we brought him on as the preeminent authority on Metallica. Is that right?
SPEAKER_00:Well, I mean, I wouldn't go that far. I think our other brother would have something to say about that.
SPEAKER_02:I think you would. But since, you know, We brought you on, we got to put some kind of, you know, authority figure on it or a stamp on it. But today we're going to talk about the rise and fall of Metallica. So when you think Metallica, I mean, most people would say the greatest heavy metal band ever. I mean, which they, I mean, in some respects they are, right? They're the most well-known band. Talk to most people, they know the name. But some of us, you know, our older brother was the biggest Metallica fan we know. And he latched on to Metallica right after they were formed. I mean, I would say probably 1985, you know, 84. He was
SPEAKER_00:on board. And then... He'll say to the death still, it's not his favorite band, but it still is.
SPEAKER_02:I've never heard him say that. So next time I talk to him, I'm going to ask him that.
SPEAKER_00:He'll say like death or knee-pump death like now. And
SPEAKER_02:all you can do is laugh at him like, come on, man. I mean, Metallica, the name itself, let's just talk about the name. it's kind of the essence of heavy metal, right? Like there's certain names, Judas Priest, I think comes to mind as, as like, that's, that's a heavy metal name. Black Sabbath. Yeah. That's a heavy metal name. You know, those, those names just exude heavy metal.
SPEAKER_00:They resonate. They, they're ominous. They're, you know, all the things you want from scary music, scary parents. Well, not art because they, they didn't know what that meant.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. And, and, um, it, I mean, it transcends all cultures. I mean, heavy metal is everywhere, right? South America, Mexico, United States. You know, I mean, if you go to any European concert, they're a frigging rabbit over there, fans. You know, where they have that big concert every year. Is it Germany?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, the Wacken Festival.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:And Mexico. I mean, Mexico City.
SPEAKER_02:I mean, it's... It's great. It's one of those things that, I mean, kind of binds people from different races, different cultures. It's just, I don't think people understand. Oh, music in general. Music in general just brings people together. But heavy metal, growing up, right, we listened to it. And it wasn't like something that we came up with. It wasn't that we had cousins. older cousins than we were that listened to Black Sabbath and Iron Maiden and Led Zeppelin. They kind of introduced it to us at a young age. I mean, I was listening to this stuff, you know, by the time
SPEAKER_00:1980.
SPEAKER_02:I
SPEAKER_00:think even before that, it's Kiss.
SPEAKER_02:Kiss, yeah. Kiss, Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin. I mean, you kind of go through it and it's, I mean, they were big fans of that. And so when they introduced it to us, I think we took it and ran with it.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:So, I mean, we can sit here and discuss heavy metal forever. Like I read an article, um, maybe like eight years ago, they talked about San Antonio being the heavy metal capital of Texas, the heavy metal capital of Texas. And I was like,
SPEAKER_00:what? Bullshit. I didn't do that. No. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:I was like, bullshit. I was like, Joe's Garage in Fort Worth.
SPEAKER_00:Dallas,
SPEAKER_02:Fort Worth. Dallas, Texas.
SPEAKER_00:Come on, man.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, because...
SPEAKER_00:And, you know, as a, like, metal fan, because of y'all, I have been to shows in San Antonio. I've been to shows in Houston. I've been to shows in Dallas. I've been, like, the metal scenes are different. You know, obviously there's more Latinos in San Antonio.
SPEAKER_02:Uh-huh.
SPEAKER_00:But the fervor, the, like, it's different in Dallas maybe it's you know that's us being biased but it's different
SPEAKER_02:well here's the thing here's where I had a big issue with it because I've lived in San Antonio for the past um what 25 26 years and it's not just heavy metal but every almost every big act every big band just hops over San Antonio they go to Dallas and And they go to Houston. Sometimes they go to Austin. But if they're going to skip a city, they skip San Antonio. And when I moved down here, I'm like, what the hell? Because living in Dallas, you get every great show. Every great show goes to Dallas. Every great show goes to Houston. And for some reason, San Antonio, sometimes Austin, they just get– they're like an afterthought. And so you can't very well be– the heavy metal capital of Texas, if shows don't even come here. I'm sorry. Hey,
SPEAKER_00:the only thing...
SPEAKER_02:Go ahead.
SPEAKER_00:Your favorite band, Iron Maiden, they always either start their tour, U.S. tour, in Texas or end it there. Correct. I mean, we just went. The Dead Last Show, right? And The U.S. in San Antonio, which that doesn't do much for our concert.
SPEAKER_02:But, you know, maybe because I'm here and I'm the biggest Iron Maiden fan, you know, they're like, hey, let's give Jaime a break. Because I did drive to Dallas, you know, or yeah, we did drive to Dallas for a concert. We went to Austin for a concert. But here's the other thing, right, I was thinking about. There are concerts that... you know you the bands that we saw in dallas and i mean we we saw shows everywhere right but some of the bands that we saw in dallas went to small venues small venues man it was like joe's garage is is my house is probably bigger than joe's garage
SPEAKER_00:no and then When I started going to shows, there was Deep Ellum Live, Galaxy Club, Bronco Bowl.
SPEAKER_02:Billy Bob's, was it Billy Bob's? Yeah. There was warehouses. I mean, sometimes it would just be warehouses somewhere in downtown Dallas off of Deep Ellum. I don't know who's booking these shows, these managers. But you would get big acts in Dallas every single time. So I did have an issue with that. I did read the article. I did comment. So if you look at that article, I was like, negatory, erroneous, erroneous on all
SPEAKER_00:accounts.
SPEAKER_02:But anyway, Metallica. So we'll get some background, right? I'm just going to pull up your, you know, run of the mill Wikipedia Metallica page. And I read the first sentence, right? American heavy metal band formed in Los Angeles, 1981, James Hetfield, Laws Ulrich. If you know Metallica, you know those two names. Some people hate those two names and most people hate Laws Ulrich.
SPEAKER_00:He just is insufferable sometimes. He can be that person, right?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. But growing up, listening to Metallica, listening to Metallica around the time that they kind of came out of nowhere, you associated Metallica with a Bay Area band, the Bay Area thrash scene. That's just what you associated them with. So when I hear that or when I see that they formed in L.A., I mean, that's something, okay, they might have, but they're not associated with L.A. They're associated with the Bay Area band. I mean, yeah. The other thing that I was talking to you before we started recording is that I saw an interview with Lars Ulrich and they were asking him, you know, how did you come up with the name Metallica? And he was saying that he had a friend that was going to start a magazine and he had two names that he had picked out and one was Metal Mania and the other one was Metallica. And according to the story, you know, he said, Laws Ulrich said, kind of pushed him towards doing Metal Mania because he felt like, I'm going to take Metallica and start my own band with that name. Now, when I saw that, or when I saw that interview or that YouTube video or whatever, that was new to me. You know, it was like, okay, I didn't know that. Yeah,
SPEAKER_00:I haven't heard that story either. I
SPEAKER_02:mean, what did you hear? When you first heard of Metallica and how they came up with the name, what did you think about? I
SPEAKER_00:mean, this was the 80s, right? I mean, obviously, I'm younger than y'all, so this is pre-internet, right? So everything is kind of just out there, and it's just rumors and hit creator and circus magazine.
UNKNOWN:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:I thought they were going to be Alcoholica, right?
SPEAKER_02:Alcoholica. And there were shirts that said Alcoholica. And I mean, that's kind of what you heard. And maybe it is the fact that social media has information everywhere. Back then, if you remember, we would read the album covers from cover to cover. We would read the cassette. We'd pull that cassette out. We'd read the lyrics. You know, we'd read the thank yous. Sometimes, you know, they'd be like, ah, we want to thank, you know, San Francisco area or this guy or these fans.
SPEAKER_00:Real quick.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Real quick. Did y'all have Metallica on vinyl or cassette? Did y'all already transition to cassette? Because I don't remember if there was any.
SPEAKER_02:We had vinyl. Okay. Yeah. I had the Master of Puppets vinyl album. Bancho, our brother, remember he had the gold Creeping Death album? I mean, it was a
SPEAKER_00:huge... He's got to have that somewhere still. Yeah,
SPEAKER_02:he ran off with that when he moved out of the house. That, if I ever find it, I'm buying it. It just looked cool. I mean, most vinyls are black. For the kids out there, vinyl is your... If you look at... If you type in you know, records, you'll see a vinyl, but this one was gold. Um, and, and it looked really cool. Like when
SPEAKER_00:that, I remember that, um, I remember that, um, artwork on the creeping death single. And then obviously the B side is the famous. Am I evil song? We're getting ahead of ourselves, but continue what you were
SPEAKER_02:saying. Yeah, we are. Um, but anyway, um, I mean, we associated Metallica with Bay Area bands. When Metallica came out, they were just different, right? They were a thrash metal band. They were faster. They played, you know, aggressive. I mean, if you look at the first album that you probably came upon was Kill Em All. And the album cover is just... It's iconic. I mean, if you take the first four album covers, they are iconic. And if you look at the shirt that, I mean, I think our brother had one, but originally you had stated, what was the name of the original, what they wanted to name Kill Em All?
SPEAKER_00:Metal Up Your Ass.
SPEAKER_02:Metal Up Your Ass. And there is a shirt that, That has a toilet.
SPEAKER_00:And
SPEAKER_02:you know, when, when you start kind of getting the, the, the, I guess the, the playbook, right. You want to be shocking, but we had that shirt. It's basically Metallica. It has a, it has a toilet and, And it has a, I guess it's a fist with a knife coming through the toilet. And it does say metal up your ass. I mean, you know, if you're 12, 13, 14, you want that shirt. Like, I want that shirt. And parents at the time were probably like, what the hell is going on? Like, what is this?
SPEAKER_00:Yes. And that's like, as much as they push the envelope though. And then you have their counterparts like Slayer and, you know, which really went really crazy with the imagery, satanic imagery and all that cool stuff, which is awesome too. But, you know, Metallica at the time were kind of, you know.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, they, they, they put the envelope a little bit. So I think, I think Metallica was the, the gateway, the gateway metal band, you know, like they say, uh, what is it? Marijuana was a gateway drug. Metallica was your gateway metal band.
SPEAKER_00:And what's interesting about Metallica, I think is, uh, you know, your traditional, like if you were talking about heavy metal, like black Sabbath, really like universally kind of accepted as the, you know, the first heavy metal band, uh, And then you could make a case for Led Zeppelin, but, you know, again, there were more blues, you know, bluesy, hard blues. And even though they have metal elements to them, you know, Metallica, their influences were more punk and like new wave, what they call the new album, right? New wave of British metal, Diamond Head, all that stuff. And Iron Maiden and Old Def Leppard, that kind of music. and punk music, you know, Motorhead, kind of, so it's almost like a, because if you, these communities, these two communities don't mix together, like heavy metal and punk rock, they just don't mix, like they don't like each other, like,
SPEAKER_01:the
SPEAKER_00:punk rockers are opposers, right, we're like, so for Metallica to kind of embrace the punk rock side of their influences, and and, you know, kind of inject it into their music. And that's where the fast, you know, rhythm comes from, is punk rock.
SPEAKER_01:Right.
SPEAKER_00:I always thought that was interesting, that the metalheads hate the punk rockers, but Metallica embraced punk rock, and now everyone loves Metallica, even though they, by proxy, now like punk rock.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, no, they did so many things that were... They were apart from what was going on at the time. And then in that same, I guess, in that same realm, you have the big four, right? Now, if we say the big four to anybody that listens to metal, they automatically know what that is. So those four bands, which was Metallica, Anthrax, Slayer, and Megadeth, they kind of set themselves apart. And there is some beef between Megadeth and Metallica.
SPEAKER_00:And
SPEAKER_02:we'll tell you why. So when Metallica came up, it was Lars Ulrich and James Hetfield. And who was their guitarist? But Dave Mustaine.
SPEAKER_00:Dave
SPEAKER_02:Mustaine. Megadave. And then they had another bassist. Ron
SPEAKER_00:McGovney?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, Ron McGovney. Right. So that was the first iteration of Metallica. And then, you know, they went and go get Cliff Burton. And they start recording, right? They have a lot of music at the time. And then there's some, I guess... There's starting to be some issues with Dave Mustaine and Metallica. And it's really interesting when you listen to the Metallica side of it and then when you go back and listen to the Dave Mustaine side of it. By the time we listen to it, we love both bands, right? And it's kind of... It's cool to pick on Metallica fans if you're a Megadeth fan. And it's cool to pick on Megadeth fans if you're a Metallica fan. But...
SPEAKER_00:It's the, it's the great, the first great rivalry in metal.
SPEAKER_02:Right. Yeah. It's the same thing as ISQ versus NWA, you know, just like this guy leaves your
SPEAKER_00:bank.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. It's,
SPEAKER_00:it's
SPEAKER_02:just like that. So Dave Mustaine, the funniest thing that I, that I, the first time I heard it, I'd laughed and he said, Dave Mustaine is like, You know, stupid people and violent people don't get along. And Dave Mustaine was like, hey, you know, I drink a lot and I get violent. And these guys are just goofy, you know. And I mean, if you listen to Dave Mustaine, there's still some hatred there. Maybe it's kind of gone over, but he's still, he's never going to be cool with it.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, and then he's still like, you know, he trolls Metallica cause he wrote a lot of songs on, um, kill them all. And he, a lot of songs were also writing credits on ride the lightning. Like if you listen to the, you know, mechanics on the first negative album is four horsemen, which he wrote that song. Um, it's just funny how like over the years make like, Megadave hasn't let it go, and Metallica have always been like, whatever, Meg, whatever, Dave. You know? They dismiss them, but we'll get into that too.
SPEAKER_02:Right, because they're sort of their, the way they came up, and when we say the downfall of Metallica, it's pretty clear to people that listen to metal in the mid-80s to the late 80s to the early 90s, you know we're You know, metal fans that understand it know exactly what that timeline is. As opposed to when you listen to Megadeth, it almost seemed like they went faster and harder, you know, when Metallica kind of... I don't know, but okay, we'll work up to it. Let's
SPEAKER_00:kind of get... Oh, let me just real quick. Okay, go ahead. We're big... we were big comic book fans and comic book collectors in the eighties and nineties. Right. Do you remember the, um, heavy metal comics? I forget what the title was called. It was like heavy metal tails or heavy metal something. Um, so there was like a novel, like a graphic novelization, but it was a comic book of the Megadeth Metallica beef kind of situation.
UNKNOWN:Um,
SPEAKER_00:I don't know where that comic book is. I wish I, I don't have it.
SPEAKER_02:Isn't it called heavy metal?
SPEAKER_00:I don't know what it was called. It's like a retelling, like revisionist history of what happened with that whole thing. And it's, I remember the panel, I could see it in my, in my head. Dave Mustaine, they're kicking him out of the band. He's like, Y'all are going to regret this. He's like, I'm going to make a new band and it's going to be called Megadeth. You'll be, you know, he's being like the Green Goblin, like Diabolical. This is, you'll, you won't get away with this, Spider-Man. Like, I love it. I wish I remembered where that comic book is or somebody has it. But I'm going to do some research on it. Anyway.
SPEAKER_02:Well, they did have the movie, that animated movie that was called Heavy Metal. And I think it's kind of along the lines with that. I'm going to look it up really quick. Give me a second.
SPEAKER_00:It's a comic book. I can't remember what they were called. They were like metal something, tails or... It was the Metallica story.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, it's... What I'm pulling up is Revolutionary Comics. And it does talk about Metallica. So maybe that's the one. Hard Rock
SPEAKER_00:Comics? Wait, you... Yeah, whatever year it was, it had to have been
SPEAKER_02:like 87 or 88 or something. Yeah. I mean, when you kind of go through it, and I think you mentioned it when we were talking about this podcast, is when we saw the NWA movie here recently. When you're watching it, you're like, yeah, I remember that. I remember that too. Yes, I remember DLC getting in an accident. Yeah, we all wondered what's going to happen to his voice. It never came back. Spoiler alert. He never got his voice back. But it's the same thing. I think it's always going to be a rivalry. It's always going to be a rivalry between Slayer and Metallica. It's always going to be a rivalry between Metallica and Megadeth. And then Anthrax is kind of just over there doing their own thing, you know?
SPEAKER_00:Right. Cause they're like, uh, we didn't even really talk about the New York freshmen, which is, you know, Exodus, um, overkill is overkill from New York also.
SPEAKER_02:Um, I don't think overkill is from other, but it might be, I mean, it's, it's one of those, um, I think they're from New Jersey. So I guess it's New York, but yeah.
SPEAKER_00:East coast, but just East coast. We were trying to hunt down the famous picture of you with Exodus at the whatever signing in Dallas the other day.
SPEAKER_02:I mean, we went to so many shows as kids. I mean, it was like we worked with my dad, right? With our dad, we worked during the summer and we made enough money to go to concerts and basically buy beer. That's all we did. in the summers.
SPEAKER_00:Or wait, it was Bobby Blitz. Who did you meet?
SPEAKER_02:Bobby Blitz, yeah, the singer for
SPEAKER_00:Overkill.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, Overkill. Overkill, yeah, I have a picture where, there's a picture somewhere where I think he signed a shirt or a jacket with And there's a picture of him where he's flipping me off.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. You're wearing, you're wearing your leather jacket. I remember it. Like I could see it in
SPEAKER_02:my head. Yeah. Uh, somebody has that picture somewhere and, and it's just, it's kind of cool. You know, it was like, uh, Bobby Blitz was a singer for overkill. They were coming, they were coming to a show and it's those times where they would go to the local record store and, and, and you could just walk up and get whatever sign, meet them, take a picture with them, you know, And then be like, all right, see you at the show later. You know, it's like one of those things, like, I don't think it happens as much. I don't think it's at least, well, I don't keep up with it as much as I used to. But, you know, when have you heard, hey, Taylor Swift is going to be downtown signing autographs?
SPEAKER_00:Yes. So Overkill and Anthrax are the only ones from the East Coast because Testament and Exodus are also in California. So they're kind of on an island, you know, literally and figuratively, Anthrax and...
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, I guess you have other bands like Nuclear Assault and those bands that were working the East Coast. Right.
SPEAKER_00:The next wave of like that kind of thrashing, like all the CompuCat bands.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
UNKNOWN:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:I mean,
SPEAKER_00:well, you know, we, we, we, we don't need to get into the minutia. Yeah. Remember that bad minutia.
SPEAKER_02:Testament. Testament was, was a West coast band that was, you know, adjacent. It was like before Jason.
SPEAKER_00:Right. We call it, you know, you can go to the big eight, Metallica, Megadeth, Flair, Anthrax, Overkill, Exodus, Testament, Who would be the other
SPEAKER_02:one? Yeah, I can't think of the other one. Exodus, Overkill, Testament. Death Angel was a West Coast band. Yeah. Which I have a great story if we can get to it. But anyway, let's go back. Let's go back to Metallica. All right. So let's look at the discography, right? The first album was Kill Em All. Was supposed to be called Metal Up Your Ass. Great t-shirt. If you're a metal band, I mean, if you're a metal fan, find that shirt on Amazon. Buy it. It's awesome. You know, wear it. Wear it proudly. That was 19...
SPEAKER_00:Everyone wears Metallica shirts now, so it
SPEAKER_02:doesn't matter. Yeah, 1983. You know, set yourself apart from everybody that's wearing Master of Puppets. You know. Kill'em All came out in 1983. If you listen to Kill'em All, it's greater your You know, it's not as refined. It's raw. It's really raw. It's super raw. It's so great. It's a really good album. Then you have Ride the Lightning, where they get a little bit more, you know, a little bit more refined. You know, you get Fade to Black, you know. Right. It's just For Whom the Bell Tolls, which is a great song. Creepin' Death. Yeah, Creepin' Death. One of my favorite songs is For Whom the Bell Tolls. The album cover. is iconic you know with the um with the chair yeah the chair the electric chair you know suspended in midair and there's lightning all on it i mean it just it's great uh our brother had this um this blue jean vest with that with that on the back of it um and and it's i mean That's all I've ever thought about. Anytime I think of Ride the Lightning, I think of that jacket that he wore every day of his life for those four or five years of that time. And then, of course, you get Master of Puppets and everyone knows that album cover. It's so great. I mean, if you look at it, I mean, the red that... that's kind of in a background. And that's, what's kind of cool about Metallica, like ride the light. Well, kill them all was white background. And it had a lot of red to it because you have that kind of that, that hammer, that anvil, you know, with red. Um, and then you had master puppets, which was blue, you know, it was basically predominant color on that as blue.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Ride the lightning. And then you have, you know, master puppets, uh, and then it's, I mean, if anybody's, most people, hopefully you know what the album cover looks like, but it has the hands in the background, has Metallica in white, kind of that stone-looking white, has the hands in the background, and it has the crosses, which is, I think it resembles the, like a military, anyway, it's like a, All these crosses at the bottom. And that album cover is just iconic
SPEAKER_00:as well. Everyone knows it. Everyone knows that.
SPEAKER_02:It's
SPEAKER_00:great. I think everyone owns that t-shirt too. I might have it in my
SPEAKER_02:closet. It's so awesome. All the white crosses. The strings. You'll see some hands on either side of Metallica. The logo for Metallica. You have the hands with the strings. And for that album, they toured with Ozzy.
SPEAKER_00:Right, they were opening,
SPEAKER_02:right? They were the opening act for Ozzy. And I remember them coming to Dallas. And this was probably, I don't know, if Master of Puppets came out in 86. this was somewhere around 86, 87. So I had to been more like around 13 years old and begging our brother, uh, Pancho, right. Jose, let's go to this show. And all we needed was a truck. We needed a ride to it. Uh, at that time, you know, sometimes we didn't even have tickets to, to, uh, to some of these shows, you know, because back in the day you used to have to actually go somewhere to buy tickets. You had to go to Sears to go to Rainbow
SPEAKER_00:Ticketmaster.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, go to the Rainbow Ticketmaster booth. You'd see Sears and, you know, all these older people and then you see all these metalheads, you know.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, you'd have to stand in line. I mean, I even experienced that. Like, I'm not too much younger than y'all. Like, I still... in line at Ticketmaster Booth. But she had physical tickets, right? Like that, I wish she still had that.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. And I was telling her, I was like, get, ask, you know, ask our dad for, let us borrow the truck. And then, you know, he's like, no, you can't do it, and all this and that. But I still regret the day that we, you know, we missed that concert, which would have been, you know, one of the best concerts we ever attended. But, I mean, we made up for it, you know. The other concert, coincidentally, is this fool went to go see Iron Maiden for the Somewhere in Time tour.
SPEAKER_00:Somewhere in Time, wow.
SPEAKER_02:And it, for a time being there, it was in the Guinness Book of World Records for one of the loudest concerts, and it was held at Reunion Arena in Dallas.
UNKNOWN:Wow.
SPEAKER_02:And I hated him for it. And I still kind of hate him
SPEAKER_00:for it. Is that real? Like, I don't think I ever heard that story.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. He went to that concert with one of his buddies. I mean, I can't remember his name. He played guitar, too. He was a cool dude. But, man, I wanted to go so bad. But at the time...
SPEAKER_00:Somewhere in time. Wow.
SPEAKER_02:And... He went without me. I mean, I was a kid, right? I was probably like 13, 14. And at the time, you know... I
SPEAKER_01:was six.
SPEAKER_02:You know, you're at that age where your older brothers don't want to hang out with you.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're a Nathan. Oh, I know. I know. It's fucking brilliant.
SPEAKER_02:And you're like... I want to go. That's my favorite band. And they're like, yeah, so see you later. And I still hold a little bit of a grudge. And then sometimes it's a big-ass grudge because I'm like, that was probably one of the best concerts ever in the history of concerts. But yeah, I still hate them for it to this day. But anyway, Master of Puppets, 1986. And then... the tragedy hits, right? Right now, what is it? The VH1 or the MTV True Life Story or whatever. This is when the screen goes dark.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_02:It's like tragedy hits, Metallica.
SPEAKER_00:They start to play Orion in the background, right? The instrumental. I have to make light of it, but they always do that.
UNKNOWN:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, that's terrible.
SPEAKER_00:Behind the music, Metallica, and they
SPEAKER_02:play Orion. It's great. It's a great instrumental, too. But, you know, as every Metallica fan knows, Cliff Burton, they're touring somewhere in Europe or something, and their bus, basically, they crash, and he gets... He dies. I think he was asleep at the time.
SPEAKER_00:He just talked from the bus and he just, yeah, it's a whole...
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, and they were touring for Master of Puppets and he dies. And so, you know, if you're a fan of music, this happens more often than you think about. But this was a big deal for us because even as a kid, right, I'm, what, 13 years old, and I'm thinking, what's going to happen to Metallica?
SPEAKER_00:Right.
SPEAKER_02:I mean, how do
SPEAKER_00:they
SPEAKER_02:recover from
SPEAKER_00:this? Right, even if you rewind, like, I don't know, six years. I mean, I wasn't born yet, but when John Bonham died, Led Zeppelin was like, that's it. We're, there is no Led Zeppelin without John Bond. Right. Right. And they just said, we're done.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. Uh, ACDC, you know, uh, Bon Scott dying. I mean, it happens all the time. Um, Randy Rhodes, you know, he died when you're 24 years old or whatever. I mean, it does happen a lot, but those things that already happened, like, uh, In your consciousness, that's already happened. This is happening in real time. Like, one day you're enjoying Master of Puppets, and you're enjoying the greatness of Cliff Burton, and then he's dead, you know? And then you're wondering, what's going to happen to this band? Like, are they ever going to recover from this?
SPEAKER_00:Well, I mean, you could fast forward. Like, we're just going way into the future. with me when I was a teenager, it was like, you know, Kurt Cobain, Eazy-E, Tupac, you know, like, and that was just the end of, that was, that was the end, right? There was no more, there's no more vomit without Kurt Cobain. Right.
SPEAKER_02:So we're not, we're not going to talk about Selena either?
SPEAKER_00:Oh. All right. All right. Yeah. Selena. Cool.
UNKNOWN:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:but yeah, no, it was a big deal. Now I'm not going to sit here and tell you that we're sitting there crying and all that, but, but, but it was a, when, when you're now, granted my brothers and I, you know, well, you were probably part of this too. We get together and we drank a couple of beers and we, Usually this is the discussion for like 1 a.m., right? Where you've had one too many and you're sitting there going, what's going to happen? Yeah. I mean, is it over for them? I mean, all that stuff that you got from, you know, behind the music on VH1, this is what we discussed. This is what we talked about. Who would replace him, you know? And lo and behold, they find someone, right? And it's Jason
SPEAKER_00:Newsom. From your favorite band.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, from one of my favorite bands. Flotsam and Jetsam.
SPEAKER_00:Flotsam and Jetsam.
SPEAKER_02:But before that, they released a... What was it? I guess it was a VHS tape.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, Cliff Amal.
SPEAKER_02:Cliff Amal. And let me tell you, I don't have a copy of this, but... The copy that we did have, we probably wore it out. We watched it so much. It is one of the greatest freaking VHS tapes about a group ever. Yeah,
SPEAKER_00:because there's so much cool stuff in there. You see early Dave Messain in there. The interviews with Cliff Burton. We'll get to it that he's talking about. We're not trying to be big and flashy. We just get out there, do what we do to keep it that way. I'm kind of paraphrasing what he's saying, which goes against what eventually Metallica does. We want to play our music and just keep it that way.
SPEAKER_02:You remember that? Yes. Yeah, I love that quote. I think you and I were talking about it one day and I said, I don't want to be a little crass here, but I said Cliff Burton was the boss of Metallica. Yeah. I think he was the driving force of it. I think he kept them grounded.
SPEAKER_00:And creatively, you could make that case.
SPEAKER_02:And he said, you know, we're not trying to be big and fancy. You know, it's just us doing what we do And we'd like to keep it that way. And that was like etched into my brain. You know what I'm saying? I'm like, yeah, this guy was nothing to look at. I mean, he looked like basically every white guy you saw in high school with long hair. I mean, he was not like, but his essence, who he was kind of emanated throughout Metallica. So I think the downfall of Metallica. Thank you for listening. If you enjoyed this episode and you'd like to help support the podcast, please share it with others. Post about it on your social media and or leave a rating and review. To catch all the latest from us, you can follow us on Instagram and X. So thanks again and we'll see you next time.
