Jason
Newsted was always just a tad out of place in Metallica. He came in to the band just months after the death of
bass legend, and arguably the best metal bassist to ever record an album, Cliff Burton. Immediately after joining
the band he faced sort of an initiation by his band mates. My personal favourite
story is that when he would sign autographs for fans, he would write “bassface”
and when other members of the band signed the same item, they would cross out
the “b” in “bassface”...yah you get it. Even after the initiation ended he was
still just the new guy in the band, and that always held a spot in the memory
of the band and older fans of the band that he couldn’t seem to live up to
despite being an excellent bass player. Jason himself at many times during his
career still to this day has mentioned Cliff as being the best bass player to
ever live, to demonstrate that he knew he wasn’t ever in Metallica to be better
than Cliff.
