METALLICA’s James Hetfield and Lars Ulrich recently spoke about bassist Jason Newsted’s decision to leave the band 20 years ago.
“My theory now is I could love anybody, really, at the end of the day,” James Hetfield tells Apple Music’s Zane Lowe. You get to know them, you get to know where they’ve come from, you understand where their parents came from — all of that. How are you you? I can accept that. I can really accept that. There was more to be revealed. I mean, really.
“He was at a point where he was at; we were at a point where we were at,” James continued. “It happened because it happened. If it was like that right now — say, Robert [Trujillo, METALLICA’s current bassist] comes and says, ‘Hey, I’m done here.’ We would fight. We would fight, or I would fight for him. I didn’t know about the fight back then.”
Ulrich added: “If you think about it, Jason is the only member of METALLICA who’s ever left willingly, and that in itself is a statistic. And the resentment from James and I was just so… [We felt like] you can’t do that. You can only leave if we want you to leave. And then we weren’t equipped at the time to do a deep dive into why he was leaving. And so, of course, now you can see 20 years later, it makes complete sense.
“We write the songs; we make the decisions; we do all of it,” Lars continued. “You have no creative outlet in this band; you have no creative voice. And then when you go and do something that gives you satisfaction and a way for you to express yourself to the rest of the world, then we get fucking pissed at you. And then that resentment then goes to you leaving the band. I mean, that’s kind of Psychiatry 101 here. But we weren’t equipped to see that side of it. Twenty years later, so now it makes complete sense.”
Ulrich added: “Jason gave 14 years — every day, every performance, he was there always… I mean, we always used to joke. It’s, like, ‘He’s so fired up. Come on, dude. Slow down.’ He was the fucking first guy in and the last guy out. He was signing autographs when we were driving by waving on the way out of the buildings. I mean, he really was. And I now [am] finally equipped to appreciate every moment that he gave. And we have, I think, so much respect for each other now, so much appreciation. Ten years ago, when we did the 30th anniversaries, when he came up and played four nights with us at the four Fillmore shows, played two nights with us, seeing Rob and him together up there, that felt like it was the beginning of the thawing of where we are now. But he’s been a very integral part of the [Black Album] reissue and the re-release and has done interviews and been very, very helpful. He did the unboxing of the box for the cameras and the whole thing. I mean, he’s been so gracious.”
You can check out the full chat with Zane Lowe on Apple Music at this location after 1PM ET / 10AM PT today (Oct. 6)
