James Hetfield has been the frontman for Metallica since the band officially formed in 1981. However, according to members of UK metal band Raven, who took the San Francisco metal legends on their first-ever national in 1983, Hetfield was only supposed to be a fill in until Metallica found a different vocalist.
In a new interview with Guitar World, Raven members John and Mark Gallagher recalled how Metallica were still a work in progress when the two bands joined up on their tour.
"They were a little fractured at the time, saying, ‘We need to get a good singer.’ That was the whole thing," remembered Mark Gallagher. "We were like, ‘What’s the matter with James Hetfield? He’s doing pretty good.’ They said, ‘That’s just temporary.’ I think they were looking at John Bush [Armored Saint, later Anthrax] to be the singer."
“But even though they were a young band, they were ahead of what most bands would be at that point, as far as the time they put into it," Gallagher continued. "It definitely had something. It had that hard edge, which was cool.”
Hetfield has previously admitted himself that he wasn't the ideal frontman when Metallica first began to play together. In 2022, when the band had a limited engagement SiriusXM channel, Mandatory Metallica, he remembered his early doubts about singing.
"A lot of those earlier memories were celebrated with a band called Armored Saint, who were a fellow LA band back in the early '80s when we were getting started," he said (via Louder). "Obviously John Bush was a singer we got to know really well and really really tried to get in him into the band as a singer."
"[It] didn't work out, he was dedicated and very in love with what he was doing with his brothers in Armored Saint, and we absolutely respect that but we got to hear them and love them every single night," Hetfield added.