David Ellefson Explains How James Hetfield Became Really The Frontman Of Metallica

Megadeth bassist and co-founder David Ellefson opened up about the fact that James Hetfield being the frontman of Metallica during an interview with Waste Some Time With Jason Gree and revealed it’s quite interesting that former lead guitarist of Metallica and current member of Megadeth Dave Mustaine was not the frontman.

As many of you know, Dave Mustaine was the original lead guitarist of Metallica for a brief amount of time with Mustaine toured and co-wrote four songs that appeared on the band’s debut studio album ‘Kill ‘Em All’, and co-wrote two songs that appeared on the second studio album, ‘Ride the Lightning.’

After his departure from the band, the iconic guitarist went on a music career with Megadeth for which Mustaine was the vocalist, deciding to take the job after a series of unsuccessful vocalist auditions, along with being the lead guitarist.

During a recent interview, his bandmate, bassist David Ellefson opened up about Megadeth guitarist and stated that he wasn’t the singer with Metallica, however, Mustaine was the frontman according to Ellefson when he was a member of the band.

Furthermore, Megadeth bassist stated that he finds it interesting that James Hetfield has been the frontman of Metallica while there was Dave Mustaine in the band as he was the member who was the most interactive with the audience, however, Ellefson also stressed the fact that Hetfield is one of the greatest frontmen in the rock and roll history.

Here is what Ellefson said:

“So it was weird that we then turned into a four-piece, which is what Dave had just come out of from Metallica, and of course, in Metallica, Dave was not the singer. He was kind of the frontman, as I understand. Between the songs, he did all the banter with the audience, but he was obviously the lead guitar player and James Hetfield was the singer.

It’s kind of interesting how then James became really the frontman of Metallica when Dave was out of there, and then Dave now in Megadeth becomes the singer, so they both kind of swapped roles, they both kind of had to step up to maybe the parts of the job they weren’t doing before.

Not that Dave was never hired to be the singer of Metallica. So it’s kind of funny that that was now a new role for him, and of course, Hetfield has become one of the greatest frontmen in rock ‘n’ roll, period.

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