The Batlord

Everyone on this site has heard Kill 'Em All about a million times so there's no point in mentioning it, though as far as I'm concerned it's certainly appropriate. But demos, even ones from such a band as Metallica, generally go unnoticed enough that I can slip one in. And especially this one. Obviously since I wasn't there I can't really know, but according to my research (Magic School Bus reference FTW!) this demo seems to have had almost as big an influence on the burgeoning thrash metal movement as their actual debut due to the tape trading underground. So, demo or not, this is a milestone.

This has pretty much most of the songs from the debut, so it's not like it's necessarily required listening for anyone who isn't a Metallica completionist, but it's got a couple differences that bear mentioning. First of all, on Kill 'Em All James Hetfield's voice is a feral bark, but on this he'd apparently not settled on that style yet. In fact at times it almost sounds like he's auditioning to be in Cheap Trick. Not necessarily a good thing, but it adds a certain charm, and the music is as it should be so it's a minor complaint.

And secondly, this is the only Metallica recording (checks the Metal Archives to be sure), yes, the only one to feature Dave Mustaine, and as such they hadn't yet had to rewrite "The Mechanix" into "Four Horsemen". As far as I'm concerned getting to hear Metallica play the original is worth listening to this all by itself...even if James sounds like Robin Zander. Although a hilarious thought occurred to me just now. Motley Crue had a heavy Cheap Trick influence, and Vince Neil (who started out in a Cheap Trick cover band) was definitely himself channeling Robin Zander on their first album, and supposedly James was a big Motley fan back when they'd just started out playing the Sunset Strip...so...I think Metallica's vocals may have been based on Vince Neil back in the early days. Oh god I want to meet James Hetfield and ask him about that just to be a dick.

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