James, Lars and Dave move to Mark Whittaker's house at 3132 Carlson Boulevard in El Cerrito which quickly becomes the center for parties. The band eventually convinces Whittaker to become their road manager, sometime-producer and all-around coordinator.

"Q: Was it a manic heavy-metal bachelor pad?

Lars: Every cliche that you could muster up. Me and James each had a bedroom. Dave Mustaine slept on the couch. Dogs running around. We had the old garage converted into a rehearsal room with egg cartons. It was the refuge, the sanctuary for everybody in the neighborhood. People would come over and live there, hang there. It was a lot of fun—when you're 19."

— "Married To Metal" interview, 1995

"We'd throw parties and take all the furniture out of the place, so you could get wild without breaking stuff. If there was something there, it would get broken."

— James, Metallica Unbound

Fun times at Metalli mansion in El Cerrito:

1. First photo session with Ross Halfin, 1984
2. Lars wearing silver spray paint, 1984
3. James, 1984
4. Lars shaving his tongue, 1985.
5. "Scary James" (and Kirk hiding in the corner)
6. Ouch!

Johnny 'Z' Zazula, concert promoter and owner of New Jersey's Rock n' Roll Heaven record store, invites the band to the east coast to play some shows and record an album after he hears their demo No Life 'Til Leather.

Metallica play live with Cliff for the first time at The Stone in San Francisco. The next show at The Stone, on March 19, is videotaped and it appears on the Cliff 'em All video. It is also the band's last San Francisco show with Dave Mustaine.

"Metallica, those Supreme Metal Gods, those Purveyors of Raging Sonic Decapitation, those Rabid Vodka-powered maniacs, blew our faces off as they stormed onstage through a flurry of smoke and blinding lights and got things banging with 'Hit The Lights.' It was time to DIE!

The moment many had been waiting for soon arrived: bassist Cliff Burton's solo spot! Cliff built his solo from a haunting classical guitar-sounding ballad up to a crescendo of some of the fastest, most apocalyptic bass raging ever performed!"

— Brian Lew (Whiplash fanzine) about the first show with Cliff, "The Bay Are Club Days Revisited"

1-4. At The Stone, March 5, 1983
5. James at The Stone, March 19
6. Flyer for the March 19 show

Metallica record their third demo of "Whiplash" and "No Remorse." Extensive partying follows.

"As usual, Dave drank earlier, more and faster than anyone else present and passed out by nine—before the party had even started! This was ignored, as everyone just partied around and over Dave, occasionally trying to wake him up, drag him around, or pose for photos with his lifeless frame."

— Ron Quintana (Metal Mania), Metallica: Unbound

Metallica go to the east coast to meet Johnny Zazula.

"We sent them $1,500 to come across. They got a one-way rental: a U-Haul van and a truck. Literally, they had two drivers and they slept in the back with all their gear, and they delivered themselves to my front door. It was basically, 'Well, we're here—what do we do next?'"

— Johnny Z, Justice For All: The Truth About Metallica

"When recording started, the group had taken residence with the Zazula family, but they were banned from the house after raiding the liquor cabinet and downing the couple's cherished wedding champagne. 'They'd been saving it forever,' recalls unrepentant James. 'We popped the top and drank it. That was it.'"

— Metallica: Unbound

The band sleeps in their rehearsing space, a place called Music Building. Anthrax, friends of Johnny Z, gives Metallica a refrigerator and a toaster oven and brings the guys back to their houses to shower, since there is no shower in the space.

"They shared the rehearsing room with Anthrax, but they actually slept in a terrible area. It was like a storage place, it was a part of the building where they had all the rubbish."

— Johnny Z, Justice For All: The Truth About Metallica

"I found a piece of foam on the ground, and I used that as my mattress to put my sleeping bag on. I remember washing my hair in the sink using cold water, it was brutal."

— Kirk, Justice For All: The Truth About Metallica

Johnny signs Metallica to his new label, Megaforce Records, after shopping their demo and finding no takers.

Metallica decide they need to get rid of Dave.

"Dave Mustaine was really the face of the band. James was the lead singer but Mustaine did all the connecting with the fans from the stage, because James was still incredibly shy. Mustaine was certainly a character, but it just became too much for the rest of us, particularily with his mood swings. James and Cliff and I were happy, silly drunks, but Mustaine could get really aggressive and it just stopped becoming fun. That outweighed any fear we had of replacing him."

— Lars, Kerrang! Legends: Metallica

One morning they wake him and James gives him a bus ticket back to California. Replacement guitarist Kirk Hammett, of Exodus, flies in to fill the vacant slot that same afternoon.

"We went in where he was sleeping and woke him up. I was the one who was definitely closest to him at the time and I didn't want to say anything, and as Cliff was the newest member he didn't want to say anything, so we both pointed to James to do the dirty deed. We told him and he looked at us and didn't really know what to do. He was sitting on the bus before I think it hit him. In retrospect, it may have been a dirty way to do it, but he was so unpredictable it was certainly the safest!"

— Lars, Metallica: In Their Own Words

"It wasn't like we really auditioned Kirk. He came in, set up, played and he was there. I don't know what we would have done if we hadn't liked him. We didn't have the money to send him back."

— James, Thrasher Magazine, 1986

1. Band with Johnny Zazula in New York
2. Johnny Z in his Megaforce Records office
3. Flyer for the East coast shows promoted by Johnny Z

Kirk Hammett performs his first live show with Metallica at The Showplace in Dover, New Jersey.

"Kirk's got Dave's speed, but Dave was all speed. He had no feeling, he had no pull-offs, he had no brilliant things. He tried to get brilliant sometimes, but it would sound awful."

— James, Metallica: Unbound

"It seemed like I was in the band right off the bat, and I found myself playing a bunch of shows with them. They never formally told me I was in the band, and it didn't fully sink in until they said, 'We are going into the recording studio, do you think you can do it?' I was like, 'Sure.'"

— Kirk, mtv.com, 2003

Kirk Hammett

Metallica: James, Lars, Cliff, Kirk

Metallica head into the studio to record their first album Kill 'Em All at Music America in Rochester, NY, produced by Paul Curcio.

"We spent six weeks up in Rochester, New York, recording the album at the Music America Studio. The actual studio is in the basement of this huge old colonial-type of club house. Up on the second floor there's this huge ballroom which is perfect for getting a good drum sound. The only problem is the place is fucking haunted, so I had to have someone else up there the whole time I was recording. My cymbals would start spinning, you know shit like that. It was scary, but I would love to record there again."

— Lars, August 1983, Metallica: In Their Own Words

The original name of the album, Metal Up Your Ass, is rejected by record distributors who refuse to release an album with that title.

"Cliff said, 'Those record company fuckers, you know, kill 'em all.'

— James, Thrasher Magazine, 1986

The original cover artwork to go with the "Metal Up Your Ass" title was an image of a knife protruding from a toilet bowl.

James wearing a t-shirt with the original "Metal Up Your Ass" artwork.

Metallica release Kill 'Em All on Megaforce Records in the U.S.A, and Music For Nations in Europe.

"I really like the cover... The idea of a sledgehammer lying in a pool of blood may sound kinda simple, but it looks real neat..."

— Lars, August 1983, Metallica: In Their Own Words

"[For Kill 'Em All] we got a half a star in Sounds Magazine."

— Kirk, Thrasher Magazine, 1986

1. Kill 'Em All
2. Life imitates art—backstage in Palo Alto, Halloween, 1983

The band hit the road with Raven for the Kill 'Em All For One tour (the name of the tour is a combination of the names of the two bands' Megaforce albums.)

"The first proper tour was Raven and Metallica in a Winnebago from the east coast to the west. There were really horrible smells on that bus as there was a lot of drinking, puking and fucking going on. You would have to get drunk to actually fall asleep on that thing as it was so horrible. We would always fight for the top bunk. The air conditioner broke down somewhere in Texas, so it was about 200 degrees when you woke up."

— James, Metal Hammer Magazine, 1999

"As this evening's show at The Stone was to be the final date of the tour, the bands pulled out all the stops in order to make it memorable. During Raven's set, Lars and James high-kicked their way across the stage, spraying beer at Raven as they danced by. They were followed by Cliff, who literally flooded the stage by dousing everyone and everything with water. It was amazing no one was electrocuted. Later, to close out the show and the tour, James and Lars returned to join Raven for backup vocals and some rampaging air guitar. As soon as the 'all star' jam was completed, James took a flying leap into the audience."

— Metallica: Unbound

"The only time I had money was when we went out on the road and had per diems. I remember, on our first tour, we got 10 bucks a day on days off and seven bucks on a show day because we could always eat free at the gig."

— Kirk, "Pretty Hate Machine" interview, 1996

"We used to sleep four to a room. I had to share a bed with Lars. He used to take all the blankets. I would never sleep with Cliff, because he had really pointed elbows. Really bony. Actually, no one snores much. We drool a lot."

— Kirk, on the early Metallica tours, Frayed Ends of Metal

Kill 'Em All For One tour:

1-3. Chicago, August 12, 1983
4. James at the Keystone, Palo Alto
5. With Raven at The Stone, S.F., September 3, 1983—the end of Kill 'Em All For One tour
6. James at the S.F.'s Record Vault for an autograph signing session, Sept. 3, 1983

Metallica spend time writing new material for the next album, Ride The Lightning.

In Boston, Mass., while on tour with Anthrax, the truck with the band's equipment is stolen—the only gear left are the guitars that John Marshall stashed in his hotel room, concerned that the extreme cold outside would warp their necks. For the remaining three dates of the tour, Anthrax loans Metallica their stage equipment. It is said that the song "Fade To Black" is inspired by this incident.

"If any of you know the fuckers who stole our equipment the last time we were here, please kill them for us."

— James, at the rescheduled gig in Boston, Metallica Unbound

By the end of the year Kill 'Em All sells over 17,000 copies—an unheard-of figure for an independent release—but the band still struggles financially, often eating an average of one meal a day, and, without money for hotels, taking refuge with loyal fans on the road.

"Marshall remembers fans buying them meals, and on Christmas Eve [1983], a female admirer took them to a fancy restaurant, paid for the sizeable meal, and left. On the way out, the group was accosted by their waitress, furious because she hadn't tipped her. 'She freaked out, yelling and all pissed off,' recalls Marshall, 'But we would barely have eaten that day if it hadn't been for that meal."

— Metallica: Unbound

1-3. Record signing, Walnut Creek, Ca., November 1983
4. Flyer about the stolen equipment
5. "Fade To Black" lyrics

Metallica fly to Europe to support Venom on the Seven Dates of Hell tour. They play to over 7,000 fans at the Aardschok Festival in Zwolle, Holland.

Their first gig is in Zurich, Switzerland. The tour almost comes to a halt as soon as the band arrives there, however, since James falls down holding a beer glass and cuts his hand open. Their first European show is, logically enough, followed by their first European party.

"It was like National Lampoon's Vacation. Metallica went fuckin' nuts on the first night. What had happened was, there were some fans outside, and one of Metallica had broken a window to get to the fans and say hello. By this time the promoters had decided that they were gonna kill them for damaging the venue, so Gem Howard from Music For Nations, who was looking after them on the tour, brought them into our dressing room and said, 'We'll put the guys in here because the security and everybody's looking for them, there's gonna be hell.' And they just sat there in our dressing room like little rabbits caught in the headlights!"

— Jeff Dunn (Venom), Justice For All: The Truth About Metallica

"As an obnoxious going-away present for their openers, before the last show Venom loaded Lars's trapset with talcum powder, causing an explosive cloud to form whenever the unprepared drummer hit a snare drum."

— Metallica: Unbound

1. January 1984, New York—rehearsing for first Euro tour and Ride the Lightning recording
2. Lars's postcard to Ron Quintana ("Metal Mania" fanzine) from the first European tour
3. The Seven Dates of Hell tour postcard

Ride The Lightning is recorded at Sweet Silence Studios, Copenhagen, Denmark.

Among the items stolen a few months earlier on Boston, is James's beloved Marshall amplifier. Before recording James searches all over Europe to find a comparable amp.

"They literally looked at every Marshall amp in Western Europe. They eventually found one that sounded good in some little Danish music shop."

— John Marshall, guitar tech, Metallica Unbound

"Everybody else was running round doing disco and shit, and I hated that. Most of the other people in the studio thought that Metallica was the worst piece of shit they'd ever heard in their lives, but I loved that."

— Flemming Rasmussen, producer, Justice For All: The Truth About Metallica

At the end of March, Metallica together with Anthrax and The Rods and Exciter are supposed to start their "Hell On Earth" tour in England, but the tour is cancelled, due to poor ticket sales.

"About two weeks before the start of the tour we noticed to our dismay that our best-selling show was the Newcastle Mayfair where we'd sold a massive 14 tickets. It was at that moment that we thought the tour might not be the success we wanted it to be, so we cancelled it immediately."

— Gem Howard, tour manager, Metallica: A Visual Documentary

Metallica, who have already flown to London from Denmark, spend their time hanging out in London with Anthrax. At the end of March and beginning of April they plays two gigs at the Marquee in London.

1-3. London, March-April 1984
4-5. At the Marquee
6. With Scott Ian (Anthrax) in London.

Ride The Lightning is released. A printing press in France mistakenly prints 400 copies with a green cover instead of blue. These records have become collector's items.

"On Ride the Lightning album we learnt that you could still be powerful even if the pace was slowed right down, and now we've understood that you can still hit hard even when there's subtlety in the music."

— Lars, Metallica: In Their Own Words

1. Ride The Lightning
2. Misprinted green Ride The Lightning cover

Bored during the times between touring and recording, James joins a party-band called
Spastic Children as their drummer. The other members of the band include Fred Cotton on vocals, James McDaniels on guitar, and a bassist named Jumbo.

"The concept behind Spastic Children was to have fun in as un-professional a context as possible: songs were written on-the-spot during practices, musicians preferred playing instruments they had no past experience with, and the band hosted a revolving door policy of members that would come and go as desired. Cliff Burton joined, and Kirk Hammett had his turn. According to James, if the band had any kind of mission, it was merely to 'get as drunk as possible and see if we could still play, and abuse the crowd. That was the whole object.'"

— Metallica: Unbound

Among Spastic Children's masterpieces are tunes like "Pus Is Great," "I Like Farts," or "Cunt."

Spastic Children:

1. 1985 lineup: James McDaniel, Cliff Burton, Fred Cotton, James Hetfield
2-3. James modeling his homemade Spastic Children t-shirt, 1986
4. James drumming for Spastic Children, 1985
5. Spastic Child Kirk and James, 1986
6. Handbill for Spastic Children at The Rock in SF, January 2, 1987 (James—drums, Jason—guitar, Fred Cotton—vocals, Kirk—bass.)

Metallica drops Megaforce Records and signs with Elektra Records, which rereleases Ride The Lightning on its label.

"The minute the show [in Roseland, NJ, August 3, 1984] was over, I made my way to the back and said, 'All of you are not to go anywhere but to my office tomorrow. And Cliff said, 'Is there gonna be lots of beer there?' And I said, 'Whatever you want. I'll order Chinese and you'll come.'

"James and I, in the beginning, kind of didn't get along because we were definitely two different types of people. Then at some party in San Francisco, with both our heads in a toilet bowl, we kind of bonded. After that, we got along famously, him and I."

— Michael Alago, Electra's A&R representative who signed Metallica, The Frayed Ends of Metal

"Even though other offers were financially better, Elektra had a reputation of leaving complete artistic freedom with their acts. It was a pretty liberal label. They had a reputation for trying out new things that were pretty experimental at the time."

— Kirk, Thrasher Magazine, 1986

Around the same time, Cliff Burnstein and Peter Mensch from Q-Prime become their managers.

Metallica celebrates new management—with wet and sticky Peter Mensch.

Bang The Head That Doesn't Bang tour—the first major European tour with Tank to an average of 1,300 fans at each show.

Bang The Head That Doesn't Bang tour

1-4. Paris, November 1984
5. James at the Lyceum, London, Dec 20, 1984

Metallica gain the nickname "Alcoholica" from a European fan wearing a homemade T-shirt with the Kill 'Em All cover distorted.

"The first time I saw it was some kid had done a shirt, with silk screens or paints at home. He had the Kill 'Em All album cover, except instead of 'Metallica' it said 'Alcohollica,' and instead of 'Kill 'Em All,' it said 'Drink 'Em All.' Instead of the hammer with the blood, it was a vodka bottle dumped over. We thought it was pretty cool. We had shirts like that made up for ourselves."

— James

"I'd like to get a beer-holder on my guitar like they have on boats."

— James, on the sort of attachment he'd most like to have on his guitar, Guitar Player

Alcoholica at their finest

2. James and Yngwie Malmsteen at Donington, 1985. James is sporting the "Alcoholica—Drink 'Em All" t-shirt.