Enter Night_ A Biography of Metallica - Mick Wall [68]
‘We’d been to everybody,’ says Jonny. ‘Some of the biggest names in A&R in the United States turned down Metallica. I’m talking Columbia, I’m talking Arista, I’m talking most labels. The only place where there was any kind of communication and understanding of metal was this one fellow at Elektra named Michael Alago. We would go to Michael Alago and constantly talk to him about Metallica and Raven.’ A young rock fan from Brooklyn who had only just landed a job as talent scout, Alago would eventually be sufficiently persuaded by what Jonny Z had to tell him about Metallica to make a move. But not before the band had felt so left out in the cold that the only way they could see a way forward was to throw all caution to the wind and record the album on their own, without any record company support – in the bold hope of using it as bait to try and attract a major deal afterwards. ‘It wasn’t just balls,’ says Jonny. ‘You had to be absolutely mad to take a chance on something like that. It was like we were on a mission. And the mission was to take this band and make it a worldwide name – not knowing how the fuck to do it.’
Five
Long-Haired Punks
I was homeless, sleeping rough on people’s floors and couches, carrying my whole life around in plastic carrier bags, me and the portable children’s typewriter. Xavier was one of the good guys, had a place in Notting Hill. The only caveat was you had to drink lots of whisky and Bourbon – Maker’s Mark, Crown Royal, Old Grandad, never Jack Daniel’s, ‘Too touristy,’ he said – and listen to Molly Hatchet. That is, play along to Molly Hatchet, on squash rackets, which we’d hammer away at like guitars, shaking our hair, performing for the grateful millions, usually at about two in the morning. Jesus, he must have had understanding neighbours, ’cos it was louder than hell in there whenever I visited and we got up to do a gig together. He’d light some candles, refill our glasses, whack on No Guts…No Glory, pass me a squash racket and off we would fucking well go…
This one night, though, he deviated from the norm. ‘’Ere, listen to this,’ he grinned, pulling out the plastic from an album cover I didn’t recognise. Of course, I didn’t recognise most of the album covers in his collection but you could tell this was something different, obviously new, because he couldn’t wait to play it. He didn’t even get the rackets out. He actually wanted me to listen to it. Tired from a week spent on the floor of some draughty old squat in King’s Cross, grateful not to have to sing for my supper, I flopped down on the couch and waited for it to begin. I didn’t have to wait long.
It sort of faded in on a cacophony of exploding guitars and drums, more like the climactic end of an album than the beginning. Then the band found its starting place and the thing kicked off and I burst out laughing. It was the fastest, funniest thing I’d heard since the first Damned album, and the first Damned album had been the fastest, funniest thing I’d ever heard in my life. It was FANTASTIC! Not because it was deep or momentous, but because it was – well – just so damn fast and fun. I assumed it must be some sort of punk band but when I asked for the album cover to look at, it was obvious straight away they weren’t punks at all. In fact, they looked like a bunch of Iron Maiden or Motörhead fans, out for a night at the youth club disco, revved up on Anadin and cider. Then I noticed the name – Metallica – and I laughed some more. Only X could have found a metal band named Metallica!
The next track began. ‘This is the one!’ he yelled in my ear. Sure enough, out came the squash rackets and up we got. Suddenly the whole thing was even more fantastic. The guitars! My god, they sounded like machines! Cars skidding and crashing, then veering away at the last possible moment in a gigantic cloud of burning rubber. It went on and on. How long was it?