TMD has received one of the earliest METALLICA demo recordings ever unearthed. It is a recording of a rough ‘work in progress’ version of the classic song “Hit The Lights” off the groundbreaking heavy metal album Kill ‘Em All from 1983.
The song features Dave Mustaine on guitar, Ron McGovney on bass, Lars Ulrich on drums and James Hetfield on vocals. As the story goes, McGovney soon departed the band – only to be replaced by the greatest metal bass player of them all CLIFF BURTON. It’s said McGovney left the fold because he was being bullied by Mustaine… such as getting beer spilled on his bass guitar.
Not long after that incident, Mustaine himself was booted from the band by Ulrich and Hetfield for drinking too much and just being a general nuisance. Dave of course went on to form Megadeth with bass player David Ellefson in Los Angeles, California.
The rest as they say… is Rock N Roll history.
Listen to the track below.
http://www.metallica.com/
Metal Massacre 1, which was a ‘compilation’, was released on June 14, 1982… the band’s name was also misspelled as “Mettallica”… Lloyd Grant (the very first guitarist, who was a black man).. he was on the first pressing with Lars, James, and Ron. The second pressing included Mustaine’s guitars.
it’s believed that was actually the first demo of “Hit The Lights”, Lars and James had to bring
the recorder over to Lloyd’s place. This is the track that appears on Metal Massacre 1 – the actual
date on when this went down is listed as around late ’81 or early ’82. Grant was only a fill-in until Mustaine stepped into the picture.
The Metal Den ROCKS!!!
Awesome
I like this song “Hit The Lights”
metallica is number 1. \m/