During a recent appearance on Alive & Streaming hosted by DEATH ANGEL guitarist Ted Aguilar, guitarist Gary Holt recalled how EXODUS “crushed” METALLICA at a major early show.
The gig in question was the 1986 New Year’s Eve show in San Francisco, CA, alongside MEGADETH and METAL CHURCH.
“We crushed METALLICA. And look, I’m not gloating, but we crushed ’em, and they knew it,” Holt said. “It was their big homecoming. They just finished recording [1986’s] Master of Puppets, and we came out — we had more amps, we had a bigger riser, we came out looking like the headliners.
“And we were partying hard after, and James [Hetfield] comes up, and we were just getting wasted – ‘That’ll be the last time you guys open for us.’ And it was. [Laughs]
He continued: “We never played with METALLICA again until in the recent decade, and that was, like, festivals somewhere…
“I love ’em to death and I’ll always support ’em and always give them all credit where credit’s due. I consider Master of Puppets the greatest metal album ever made. Nobody’s ever come up with anything close to it — maybe close would be JUDAS PRIEST, [1978’s] Stained Class — but I give ’em all respect.
“Even with [2003’s] St. Anger, I always said, ‘Yeah, if they made it sound right, it wouldn’t be so bad.’ On YouTube, some guy re-recorded the whole album but did it with a proper drum sound and guitar sound, and the songs are killer. I never listened to [2011’s] Lulu because I don’t want it to sully my opinion of the band I admire so much. [Laughs]”
EXODUS are gearing up to release new studio album, titled Persona Non Grata, later this year via Nuclear Blast.
