The Anthrax song James Hetfield said was perfect

The Thrash Metal movement began in the early 1980s as an evolution of Heavy Metal, making the genre faster and heavier. James Hetfield and Lars Ulrich were two of its pioneers, leading Metallica, which would later become one of the most successful bands of all time.

Another band that helped shape the genre was Anthrax, group from New York City that Hetfield is a fan of. He once said that one of their songs was perfect.

The Anthrax song James Hetfield said was perfect

The Anthrax song praised by the Metallica frontman is “Only” from the band’s 1993 album “Sound of White Noise”, the first one to feature the vocalist John Bush and the last one with guitarist Dan Spitz. The band’s guitarist Scott Ian recalled, in an interview with NFR in 2022. “He (Hetfield) said it to us downstairs at the Warfield on that tour. I was actually aggressively positive about what we were doing.”

At the time, there was uncertainty within the band because they had just replaced Joey Belladonna, who had been the vocalist on their previous successful records. They were also changing their sound, inspired especially by the path bands like Metallica were taking, becoming more commercial. So when Hetfield praised that song, Ian felt they were doing something right.

Why Metallica influenced Anthrax during that era

“I also felt that we had made the record and we had the songs with ‘Only’ and ‘Room for One More,’ and ‘Black Lodge’. I thought with those three songs because remember, Megadeth already had ‘Symphony of Destruction’. They had like a multi-platinum record at this point. The ‘Black Album,’ that’s another planet, but with us, Megadeth, and Slayer, Megadeth had now reached new heights that us and Slayer, we were all like right around here selling between gold and platinum.”

“And then Megadeth went like this, they went more commercial, and I felt like we’re right on that path. Listen to these songs, ‘Only,’ ‘Room for One More,’ and ‘Black Lodge,’ the ‘ballad.’ We’re on Elektra (Records), and they’re throwing a shitton of money at it. At radio, at videos, we’ve had a machine behind us now like we’ve never had before in our lives. In my mind, I thought we were going to sell three million copies of that record. I literally thought, ‘This is it, we’re going to where Metallica (is)’.

He continued:

“Maybe not as big, because ‘Black Album,’ as I said, that’s another planet. But I thought we would at least do what Megadeth did, if not more than what Megadeth did. Where our career was, we already had a platinum record, and now I’m looking at our peers. I’m looking at what Dave did, and I’m like, ‘Hey, he sold two million records with that record because of that song.’ We’re right in there, we can definitely do what’s happening there. We’ve got the record, we made the right album for the right time coming out in 1993. There was no reason for me to not think that way,” Scott Ian said.

According to the Anthrax guitarist, every time Metallica did something it broke down another wall, the rest of the Big 4 bands “could jump over”. So the band fronted by James Hetfield was most of the times leading the way and showing what Megadeth, Slayer and Anthrax could also do.

“The Sound of White Noise” was the first album Anthrax released after Metallica and Megadeth had released their most successful records: “Metallica” (1991) and “Symphony of Destruction” (1992).

John Bush nearly became Metallica’s vocalist in place of James Hetfield

John Bush, the vocalist of Anthrax on that song, was curiously almost selected to be Metallica’s frontman when the band was still looking for someone to handle the vocals.

James Hetfield himself told that story in an interview with Sirius XM in 2021. “A lot of those early memories (of Metallica) were celebrated with a band called Armored Saint. (They) were a fellow L.A. band back in the early ’80s when we were getting started. Obviously, John Bush was a singer we got to know really well. (We) really, really tried to get him into the band as the singer.”

“It didn’t work out. He was dedicated and very in love with what he was doing with his brothers in Armored Saint. We absolutely respect that. But we got to hear them and love them every single night. We did get a crew member from them, our buddy (guitar tech) Zach Harmon. (He) was running their whole show, ended up on our tour bus for some reason, somehow, which was quite awesome. [Chuckles]”.

He continued:

“But I’ll tell you, the Armored Saint guys were always there to have some fun, they were up for anything all the time. We would make fun of them a little bit because of their outfits. They had to have little wardrobe malfunctions on stages and, you know…”

“Actually, Zach, the guy that we lifted from them, was one of the guys that would come out onto the stage and fight John Bush, the singer, in an actual Armored Saint duel, I guess you would say. Basically, two guys in armor with swords going at it. A little bit of medieval trickery there for the crowd but a lot of fun. So we toured with these guys for years and years and they’re sweet guys. They really have a great place in our heart,” James Hetfield said.

Bush was born in Los Angeles back in 1958 and has been the vocalist of Armored Saint since 1982. Some of their most famous songs are “Can U Deliver”, “End of The Attention Span” and “Reign Of Fire”. He was Anthrax’s frontman from 1992 to 2005 and in 2009 and 2010. With them he recorded the albums “Sound of White Noise” (1993), “Stomp 442” (1995), “Volume 8: The Threat Is Real” (1998), “We’ve Come For You All” (2003) and “The Greater of Two Evils” (2004).