Dave Mustaine Recalls Violent Fights In Metallica’s Early Days
Dave Mustaine has revisited some of the darker, more chaotic moments from Metallica’s earliest years, describing how his temper and heavy drinking shaped his behaviour while he was in the band. In comments drawn from a new interview, the Megadeth frontman said he was quick to step in when he felt someone was “getting in your face” or taking advantage, painting a picture of a combustible scene around the Bay Area thrash breakthrough in the early 1980s.
Recounting one incident at a club, Mustaine said James Hetfield urged him to intervene when a man was hitting a woman, and Louder reported that Mustaine remembered Hetfield pointing at him when the man asked, “Who’s gonna kill me?” forcing Mustaine into a fight “on the spot.”
Mustaine also recalled breaking someone’s leg after they were “giving” drummer Lars Ulrich a hard time, and he contrasted his own drinking with the way he viewed Hetfield and Ulrich’s alcohol-fuelled moods at the time. In his memoir, he has described himself as becoming more rage-driven the more he drank, rather than “goofier,” and suggested that dynamic contributed to the volatility that surrounded the band’s earliest shows.
The memories add to a long-running thread in Mustaine’s public reflections on his Metallica period, including how his earliest interactions with the group were shaped by intensity and confrontation well before their mainstream breakthrough.
Mustaine has since said he believes his younger self “just needed to be loved,” but the stories underline how violent and unpredictable the thrash scene could be as Metallica moved from club shows toward a career that would reshape heavy music.
