James Hetfield's voice is synonymous with Metallica's sound, but there was a moment early on in the band's career where they had their doubts.
Original Metallica manager and founder of Megaforce Records, Johnny Zazula revealed to Team Rock that James Hetfield, who was quite the introvert, had some early stage fright when it came to performing vocals. That's when somebody suggested Lars handle vocals:
"Lars and I planned a lot of stuff. But James wasn't the most confident of singers. I don't think he felt comfortable. At one point there was even talk of Lars becoming the frontman. For about five seconds."
Thankfully, the band came to their senses and James sucked it up and got behind the mic and the rest is history.
Of course, we have some idea of what the band with Lars upfront would sound like. Here's some footage of an impromptu jam in 1992 where Lars and James switched it up…
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b7lA9eapdGI[/youtube]
