List of Metallica demos


The American heavy metal band Metallica recorded several demos throughout their career.

''Whiskey Audition Tape''

These two cover songs were recorded in then bassist Ron McGovney’s garage, during rehearsals that took place in March 1982. On the strength of this demo tape Metallica were booked to open for NWOBHM band Saxon on March 27, 1982 at the Los Angeles club Whisky A Go-Go.
Personnel
This demo tape was also recorded in McGovney's garage during March 1982. Although the demo has never been officially released, it has been in wide circulation in various bootleg versions. Apart from the songs listed below, two other tracks recorded during different sessions, consisting of songwriting ideas and various unreleased riffs, have also been widely bootlegged. One track consists of riffs and ideas that would later go on to become both Metallica and Megadeth songs, it is commonly titled as "Jam". While the other track is a melodic piece played by Hetfield and McGovney, widely known on YouTube as, "Unreleased Kill 'Em All song". The validity of these two tracks was confirmed by McGovney, during a 1996 interview with Shock Waves and also via the Metallicabb forum.
Power Metal was the name given to a demo recorded sometime in April 1982. Although the demo was never officially released, it was given the bootleg name "Power Metal" after the tagline McGovney had printed on Metallica's first business cards. The tape contained four original songs, including two new songs, "The Mechanix", written by Dave Mustaine, and "Motorbreath", written by James Hetfield. It was also, like all previous demos, recorded in McGovney's garage.
Personnel
No Life 'Til Leather was recorded on July 6, 1982. It is Metallica's most widely circulated demo tape. All of the tracks are early recordings of songs that would later appear on the band's debut album Kill 'Em All. The track listing on Kill 'Em All is the same as that on the demo tape, with the exceptions of Cliff Burton's bass solo " Pulling Teeth", "Whiplash", "No Remorse" and "The Four Horsemen". The title of the demo comes from the first line of "Hit the Lights".
The demo has been re-released twice unofficially, first under the title of Metallica: Bay Area Thrashers, and was alleged to be a live bootleg recording of Metallica in the early days, however all "live" sounds had been added from various sources including the Metallica video Cliff 'Em All. This was soon discovered by Metallica and all copies were removed from stores. The demo was re-released a second time under the title Metallica: In the Beginning... Live, containing no apparent differences from Metallica: Bay Area Thrashers.
In March 2015, Metallica announced that they will be releasing 'No Life 'Til Leather' on limited-edition cassette for Record Store Day.
As Lars Ulrich told to Rolling Stone magazine: "It's time for us to put out some next-level reissues and do the song and dance of the catalog that everyone else has done; the U2s and the Led Zeppelins and the Oasises Instead of starting with Kill 'Em All in 1983, we figured we'd go back another two years to when the band was formed in 1981."
Personnel
Metal Up Your Ass was recorded on November 29, 1982, at the Old Waldorf in San Francisco. The supporting band was Exodus, featuring Metallica's future lead guitarist Kirk Hammett. The band played all of its original material that the group had written up to that point, which included all of the songs from its previous demo No Life 'Til Leather and two new songs, all 9 of which would essentially be the entirety of their debut album minus Cliff's bass solo "Anesthesia ". Two covers of Diamond Head songs were played, "Am I Evil?" and "The Prince", however "The Prince" was not recorded as the tape ran out before the full duration of the band's set.
Both the name and album cover of the demo were to be reused for the band's debut studio album, now called Kill 'Em All. However, Metallica's record company would not allow it.
Personnel
The Megaforce demo was recorded on March 16, 1983 and was the band's last demo release recorded with Dave Mustaine. The tape was recorded with the intention of introducing Burton to potential record labels and earned the band a contract with Megaforce Records. It was also played live on KUSF FM in San Francisco. The demo contained two new songs which had not been previously released. It has received a number of names including the Megaforce demo, The KUSF Demo and Whiplash/No Remorse Demo.
Personnel
The Ride the Lightning demo was recorded on October 29, 1983. It was the group's first demo recording to feature lead guitarist Kirk Hammett. The demo contained the original material Metallica had written that was not released on Kill 'Em All. Both "Ride the Lightning" and "When Hell Freezes Over" were co-written by Dave Mustaine. "Fight Fire with Fire" and "Ride the Lightning" had been changed from their original versions due to input from Cliff Burton. All four songs appeared on the band's second studio album Ride the Lightning. The four demos for Ride the Lightning were recorded at the expense of Metallica's European record label, Music for Nations, at the same time the band recorded versions of "Seek & Destroy" and "Phantom Lord" to be used as fake "live" b-sides for the "Whiplash" and "Jump in the Fire" singles. In 2005 seven other re-recorded demos surfaced on bootlegs. Out of the seven demos that surfaced, only "Trapped Under Ice" was confirmed as an official demo.
Personnel
The Master of Puppets demos were recorded on July 14, 1985 and was essentially a rehearsal more than it was a demo. The demo included five songs that were included on its third studio album, Master of Puppets.
Personnel
The …And Justice for All demos were recorded in 1987 and included early, shorter versions of songs which later appeared on the band's fourth studio album, …And Justice for All. It was the group's first demo album to feature Jason Newsted on bass, since the death of Cliff Burton. The intro to "Blackened" on the demo is an unreversed version, unlike the reversed version that appeared on …And Justice for All. "The Frayed Ends of Sanity" was recorded with gibberish sung in place of most lyrics, although the final version of the song contained lyrics. "Eye of the Beholder" had two different demo versions, however there are few differences between the two besides running time and some lyrical differences, one of which includes an improvised lyric about James needing to write lyrics for the song. Most demo versions of the album do not include both takes of the song.
Personnel
The demos recorded for Metallica’s self-titled fifth album were recorded by James and Lars on August 13, 1990 in Lars’ home studio “The Dungeon”. Four of the songs from this particular session were later released as B-Sides on various album singles. Two other songs, “The Unforgiven” and “Holier Than Thou”, were recorded as demos during studio recording sessions.
Personnel
Many of the songs that would later appear on both the Load and Reload albums were recorded as demos by Hetfield and Ulrich between winter 1994 and spring 1995, in Ulrich's home studio “The Dungeon”. A large portion of the recorded tracks were released on the MetClub only release “Fan Can III”, while other songs were released throughout various singles from both albums. Most songs were released under working titles, as opposed to their final titles as appear on both albums.

''Fan Can III''

Single releases

Personnel
Metallica's ninth studio album, Death Magnetic, had all its songs released as demos, recorded between November 2005 and January 2007. The demos were included on a bonus disc titled Demo Magnetic, released with a different "experience" version of Death Magnetic. The track listing order remained the same, however the track list uses the working titles instead of the final titles. All music was written by Metallica, while all lyrics were written by James Hetfield. It is the group's first demo album to feature Robert Trujillo on bass.
Personnel