Most bands who've gone non-stop for 35 years have more than a few skeletons in their closet, and Metallica's no exception. Never minding the whole Napster thing, they've pulled some shady, shady stuff since even before they got huge. They'd like us to focus on the music and not on the following stories, but we've never been good at doing what other people like.
Metallica started life as a cover band, but they didn't play much Aerosmith, Led Zeppelin, or anybody else famous enough to get paid tribute by literally everybody with a guitar. They mostly covered obscure British metal acts like Diamond Head and Budgie, rarely covering anyone more famous than Motorhead or the Misfits. That alone would help them stand out among the hordes of Kiss tribute acts. But, as drummer Lars Ulrich detailed in Metallica's Garage Inc. album, they did this for a very shrewd reason. Simply put, they never told anybody whose songs they were playing, or even that they were covers at all.
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