It would typically take any metal musician a healthy amount of endurance to perform any Metallica track correctly. As much as the band may have simplified their sound in the 1990s with The Black Album, every single track during their thrash glory years demonstrates a masterclass in every single instrument, with Lars Ulrich even showcasing precise drum rolls alongside James Hetfield’s lightning-fast guitar riffing. While they were known as a metal machine, a mistake was hidden in plain sight in one of their most iconic songs.
When the band started out, though, it wasn’t out of the question to have a few screwups here and there. Before they even had a formal record contract, much of their debut album, Kill Em All, was recorded on the fly, leaving little room for second takes for the fledgling metal outfit.
By the time they worked on their debut album in the metal underground, they had garnered enough money to spend more time honing their craft. Working with producer Flemming Rasmussen, Ride the Lightning would become the band’s first refined sonic statement to the world, showcasing their dexterity and penchant for writing episodic tracks, including the retelling of the biblical plagues on ‘Creeping Death’.
Out of all the members, no one shined as brightly as Cliff Burton. Though bass players may have been seen as the less competent guitarists in those days, Burton was a different animal whenever he held down the low-end, playing songs like a lead guitar like the long epic ‘The Call of Ktulu’.
By the time Burton reached Master of Puppets, he had contributed his masterpiece ‘Orion’, showcasing the band’s more sophisticated side. Outside of Burton’s classically-tinged metal epic, Hetfield had devised the basis for their definitive anthem on the title track, warning their audience about the dangers drugs can have on someone.
For all of the fantastic technical feats that went into creating the song, though, there are more than a few blemishes left on the final recording. When playing what is now the final solo, Kirk Hammett admitted to screwing up one of his lead guitar phrases, which involved him pulling the string off the edge of the fretboard to create a delightfully chaotic mess.
When listening to the bass-only track, Burton makes one critical error when playing the bridge right before the chorus. Coming out of Hetfield’s harmony guitar section, the outfit locks in on a riff that concludes with two stabs of a C# power chord. Instead of playing along with the rest of the band, Burton plays a C bass note accidentally, creating a discordant rub if both parts are played side by side.
Although this could be considered a mistake, the discordant noise provides a great foreboding tone leading into the next section. Since Hetfield has already sung about the dangers of drugs controlling the protagonist, this twisted sound could easily represent the drug sinking their teeth in before Hetfield screams “FIX ME” before the solo begins. Burton may have had some bass tracks that were rough around the edges, but even when he screws up, he’s able to make mistakes with taste.
