James Hetfield’s opinion on Kirk Hammett as a guitarist

Metallica‘s sound wouldn’t be complete without the incredible guitar work James Hetfield and Kirk Hammett did during their career. After firing Dave Mustaine who went on to create Megadeth, the band invited Kirk, who was in Exodus, to join them. That combination helped to make them one of the biggest Heavy Metal bands of all time. Over the decades Hetfield talked a lot about Hammett’s guitar playing and gave his opinion on him.

What is James Hetfield’s opinion on Kirk Hammett as a guitarist

“Well, Kirk’s an amazing lead player with a great lead sound. And I wish I could play like him, but I can’t. So I become the best rhythm player I can. And being the singer, I love melody. Michael Schenker is probably one of my favorite guitar players as far as melody goes. All of the kind of dual harmony things are things that I do in the studio, and Kirk comes in and does the solo stuff. I think I’m a little more subtle than him.”

“He’s pretty bombastic when he comes in with a sound. Like in rehearsals, it’s like, ‘Do you notice that you’re really, really loud?’ And he doesn’t. He just loves noises, exploring noises. It is a great combo,” he said in an interview with Newsweek in 2017. When asked by Howard Stern in 2016 how they decided who plays lead guitar in the songs, James Hetfield said: “He does it! He’s better. (Do you think he is a better guitar player than you?) Yeah. (…) I don’t like playing lead, I like writing leads, I like melody, I love playing the melodies, I love working out the harmonies and things. But actually playing them (I don’t enjoy).”

During the same conversation, Hammett talked about their musicianship: “Actually what happens is who has a better feel for the part usually dictates who’s gonna play the solo. But at a lot of times James just like defers to me because he likes rocking out and playing rhythm guitar on stage. I don’t have to think too much about it because he leaves it to me,” he said (Transcribed by Rock and Roll Garage). Although James mainly played rhythm guitar and Kirk played lead, they occasionally switched roles in the studio.

James Hetfield said he and Kirk are a “weird pair” of guitar players

James and Kirk are the most famous and successful pair of Thrash Metal guitarists of all time and in James’ view they are a weird one. The reason is because they are not close as two guitar players in a band usually are musically. “We’re a weird pair. We’re not as close as two guitar players in a band usually are. We know our limits with each other. He plays the solos. He can play solos and I can’t. Actually, I can solo, but I tend to play your standard boxy, blues shit, which I dig. I play all the rhythm tracks, and most of the main melodic lines, and Kirk just comes in and does the solos,” he told Guitar World in 1992.

However, according to Kirk, as he told Rick Beato in 2023, the only real difference between them is that James plays less lead guitar; otherwise, they’re the same. “I play more leads, that’s the only difference (between us). His right hand is so precise, a lot of my precision is in my left hand, his precision is in his right hand. We’ve learned so much from each other and James, I love him. I love him as a musician, I love him as a brother. It’s hard being in a band with him because sometimes he shows up and he will play something (impressive and I go) ‘Where did that come from?’ I’ve never heard anyone play something like that and it’s still coming,” he said (Transcribed by Rock and Roll Garage).

How Kirk Hammett writes his guitar parts with James’ lyrics

Kirk Hammett already said that he and James Hetfield are really similar as people and they can usually relate to each other in most areas of their lives. He explained that when he is writing music with the frontman, he usually absorbs what the lyrics are, get the feeling of what it means and tries to translate that into his guitar.

“When it comes to James and I, mentally we’re both challenged and sometimes we’re challenged in a similar way. We connect in a place that is not comfortable, it’s not warm and fuzzy. It’s actually a scary place. I distill it differently, he distill it differently, but that place is very, very similar and it’s dark. We are pretty much similar in that, that’s the place we occupy. So it’s very easy for me to relate to James pretty much all the time. So we have this kind of weird kind of like emotional connection. Sometimes when he is going through stuff, I can totally relate. Like sometimes I’m going through stuff, he can relate to me.”

He continued:

“Those issues are ongoing, continuous and consistent, because it’s life for us. The recognition of it is important. When it comes to James’ lyrics, I try not to single out any song or any individual lyric. I take it in as what’s the overall sentiment rather than picking certain things here and there, I wanna take it all in. (Then) I get the sentiment, like a raw emotion. I get a gut feeling, I try not to dissect it or categorize it, compartmentalize it.”

“I see it as a certain raw emotion and I go from there. It’s really consistent, because usually the sentiment is very close to just like something I’ve experienced or am experiencing. I get a global view of the raw emotion and the sentiment. Then take that in and connect to what I feel and take it to a different place through my guitar,” he said in an interview with Ataraxia (Transcribed by Rock and Roll Garage).