(Credits: Far Out / Metallica)
Sun 19 October 2025 5:30, UK
At the heart of every musician, no matter how big or small, there is a fan – or at least, there should be.
What do people get into making music for if it isn’t the love for it? Everything comes back to that, meaning that for the most part, all music makers are big music fans and can descend into nothing but that at a moment’s notice, like when Metallica met one of their heroes.
There’s something so heartwarming about this. There are countless stories of moments when huge, looming, global icons have become nothing more than excited kids in the presence of a hero. Ozzy Osbourne could barely utter a single word in the presence of Paul McCartney, claiming meeting him was “like meeting Jesus Christ” and calling the encounter genuinely one of the highlights of his whole life. Or even Taylor Swift looked like she was going to cry when Carole King, who she called “the greatest songwriter of all time”, turned to her and claimed she was the artist carrying on the torch.
People love to say you should never meet your idols, but when it goes right, it goes really right, creating moments that people never forget and never get over – like this one.
Like all good rock musicians, Metallica were inspired by David Bowie. It’s surely impossible not to be as the impact of Bowie, and his broad influence across all corners of rock, touched all sub-genres, including Metallica’s heavier world.
They wore that influence on their sleeve as the band repeatedly referenced Bowie moments. Their track ‘Lepper Messiah’ is plucked from ‘Ziggy Stardust’ lyrics as Bowie wailed, “Ziggy sucked up into his mind / Like some leper messiah.” Or on their song ‘Master of Puppets’, they nod to Bowie’s track ‘Andy Warhol’ during a riff.
So when they randomly met their idol, saying they were starstruck is an understatement.
The way it happened sounds like something from a movie. Stranded in Kansas City, the band’s ride hadn’t turned up for some reason when suddenly a tour bus pulled in. “Stops, door opens up, and David Bowie’s head comes up and goes, ‘What are you guys doing? You want a ride to the hotel?’” Kirk Hammett recalled of the insane encounter as it turned out that Bowie was in the city and staying at the same place.
“We sit down and there he is, just like, ‘Hey!’, baseball cap on. So funny, so personable and so goofy,” he continues, and that’s when it all spilt out as the Metallica boys became nothing but fans.
“Rob [Trujillo, Metallica bassist] and I sat down, once again the fan boy stuff came out, and I cannot remember all the details but we did talk about stuff like music and his love for the Dandy Warhols,” Hammett said as if he’s still buzzing about it, adding, “I felt like one of those guys in Wayne’s World.”
But then a realisation hit – what if Bowie was annoyed at them for copying those lyrics for a title? “I also remember apologizing to him, saying, ‘Sorry David for nicking the title ‘Leper Messiah’”, he said, but the personable idol didn’t mind in the slightest.
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