A FORCE TO BE RECKONED WITH
Being in the metal community and having listened to heavy metal for years, I knew signing Metallica was going to be historic. They didn’t sound like anyone else and no one sounded like them.
But I was getting in the way of a band’s contractual obligations with another record company, and I knew that could cause some major problems for me, because this issue was bigger than my career—it could affect Elektra’s parent company, Time Warner, and, thus, Krasnow. Except there was no way that I couldn’t take that risk, and the band wanted me to sign them as well.
“Nothing is impossible,” I let the guys know.
After we finished our Chinese food and drank some more beer, I called Krasnow and asked him to come into the conference room. A few minutes later, he entered in his characteristic regal way, impeccably dressed with a lit cigar in his mouth. He was the older man in the room with that overwhelming charisma dominating everyone. He nodded to the guys and shook all their hands.
“That was an incredible show at Roseland, gentleman,” he winked. “Listen, Michael wants you here at Elektra, so we want you here—and we will make it work.” Then he left, and we all raised our beers in ecstatic celebration.
I don’t believe Bob loved Metallica, but I think he trusted me, and even more importantly, Bob knew what would sell. He just knew.
Meanwhile, Megaforce was still there. That issue had grown bigger than me because it was now a matter of getting the band out of an old record contract and into a new one. Bob knew about this, but he expected me to handle it. It was a scary process, but I had to make it work.
So, I called Jon Zazula. I had told him I had listened to the Raven demo and thought it was terrific but that it wasn’t for us. Then I told him about our interest in signing Metallica. Well, that kind of killed the already awkward conversation. He completely blew up. He was furious.
Except, I wanted them. As James Hetfield later said, “[Megaforce was] helping a baby grow . . . at some point it’s going to walk on its own, and you wave goodbye.”1
Gary Casson in Business Affairs—for whom I had the ultimate respect—was now brought in, and the lawyers took on the battle.
Finally, Elektra granted Megaforce a healthy financial deal. Megaforce agreed. Metallica was now ours. And that was my first major lesson in the demanding record business: Money talks.
We ended up producing numerous albums for Metallica, funding and supporting their meteoric rise to world domination while they became one of the highest selling rock ’n’ roll bands in history. I have remained good friends with them throughout it all as they have changed the landscape of music, of what people were listening to in hard rock and heavy metal worldwide.
In 1986, Metallica went on tour in Europe to support their latest release Master of Puppets, which, despite almost no radio airplay or music videos, became Metallica’s first certified platinum album selling over six million copies and receiving worldwide critical acclaim.2 It was also the first thrash metal album to receive platinum status.
One night, on the European leg of their world tour, Metallica’s bus was driving through Dourap, Sweden and it skidded on some black ice and turned over. No one was seriously harmed, except their bass player, Cliff. He was pinned under the bus. It was a surreal experience, and James went ballistic on the driver. He was sure the driver was drunk or fell asleep or something.3
[A]ttempts were made to rescue him from underneath the bus by lifting it with a crane, but the crane slipped, and the bus crashed down on top of Burton a second time. Band members and onlookers have given different accounts of whether Burton died upon first impact or when the bus came down again, but the promising young star died at the scene.4
The group was devastated and seriously talked about shutting the band down. They had lost a beloved brother, a lovely young man, a magnificent musician.
After many discussions, the guys finally decided, in honor of Cliff and the unique beauty and strength he had brought to the music, to continue on.