James Alan Hetfield was born on August 3rd, 1963 in Los Angeles. From his roots a fact that influenced Hetfield was the religion of his family. His family had a religion apart from science and man. When James was a child, he could not go to the doctor, receiving chemistry or science related to the human body classes, to James’s family, God would send them diseases and heal them, so they did not need any external components to it. This religious conviction so fierce grounds the rebelliousness of the boy and his unstable adolescence. His current net worth is $215 million.
Beginnings in music.
His musical career began when he was nine. He played the piano frequently with his brother David. Soon he discovered that what he wanted was the guitar, with this in mind, he founded his first group, Obsession, formed mostly by a group of friends. But this band fell precipitously, although they had some moments of fame measured in small amounts.
Throughout this stage, James did numerous jobs such as the janitorial service of an institute or a worker in a sticker factory. The second Hetfield’s band was Phantom Lord, and as a tribute to that, the album Kill ‘Em All picks up a song with the same name.
This group later became known as Leather Charm, in this group, Hetfield was vocal, leaving the guitars to other members, since the band had modified in a small measure its composition after leaving behind Phantom Lord. It is at this time that James played his first concert, as the opening act for AC / DC & Aerosmith in Long Beach, California.
Continuing.
After the previous drummer left the band, they needed a new one. One member of the group introduced Lars Ulrich, but it was all the same, the other members did not want to continue with the Leather Charm project, and the band disbanded.
Metallica.
From very early times, James was the main Metallica composer, contributing the lyrics and most of the riffs that make to do head-banging to half world. For the first album of the band, Kill ‘Em All, he wrote most of the lyrics, and the music to all the songs of the album, except to (Anesthesia) Pulling Teeth which was an integral Cliff Burton’s song. His voice in this work is more acute and with less intonation than the others, more in line with the style of Speed Metal that his guitar released.
Other Metallica’s albums.
In 1984, Ride The Lightning is published, Hetfield returned to collaborate in all the songs of the album, either in the form of lyricist or composer, with some appreciable differences in the voice as in the musical style, that can be said that Is a Thrash Metal book. With the publication of Master of Puppets in 1986, James continued with his composition work within the group just as he had done in Ride the Lightning. This was a delicate year for the whole group and especially for James, due to the great friendship that united with Burton, his missing partner.